Why Is The Bottom Of My Foot Hurting?

You may have heard the term plantar fasciitis when asking around about pain in the bottom of the foot or researching your symptoms, but what is it and why is it inflamed? The plantar fascia is a thick fibrous band of tissue that runs along the bottom of the foot, starting along the heel and connecting to the base of the toes. It’s main purpose is to provide support to the arch along the inside of your foot. Just like any other tissue of the body, it can become stressed, strained, irritated, and/or inflamed, leading to pain anywhere from the heel to the arch of the foot. The plantar fascia is most commonly stressed due to decreased flexibility, higher body weight, increased pronation (or flat feet), activities involving prolonged weight bearing, or a rapid increase in activity levels, such as the beginning of a new running program. All these factors can place increased stress along the arch of your foot and the plantar fascia, leading to inflammation and possible pain.

So what can you do to reduce the pain and improve mobility? Physical therapy is a proven method for treating plantar fasciitis, helping patients to develop a personalized program to reduce pain and improve mobility. Typically, physical therapists will address flexibility and strength impairments, while also utilizing specific taping methods and going over proper shoe selection. Here are a few exercises typically used to treat plantar fasciitis:

Calf Stretch

Seated Plantar Fascia Stretch

Plantar Fascia Myofascial Release

If your symptoms seem to be lingering or you have more questions, contact us in order to schedule an appointment with one of our qualified physical therapists for evaluation and treatment. Get started now!

-Brian Collins, DPT

An Ounce of Prevention: Reducing the Risk of Ankle Sprains

A running joke in Seattle is that summer doesn’t start until July 5th, which therefore means prime hiking season is now upon us. Exploring the mountains and alpine lakes of the Pacific Northwest can be an excellent form of exercise, bringing with it numerous benefits to your musculoskeletal and cardiovascular systems. But with those benefits also comes the risk of injury, with ankle sprains being a common culprit. In fact, ankle sprains make up approximately 45% of all sports-related injuries in the United States. While most ankle sprains will heal over the course of 2-8 weeks, 73% of individuals who have sustained an ankle sprain once are likely to sustain another ankle sprain in the future. Fortunately, the risk of ankle sprains can be reduced via injury prevention programs. In fact, those who have sustained an ankle sprain in the past benefit even more from these injury prevention programs, experiencing a greater reduction in risk than those who have never sprained an ankle. However, the overall risk of ankle sprains is still higher in individuals who have a history of an ankle sprain. The best predictor of a future injury is a past injury. We cannot change the past, but we can alter the future by performing targeted exercises at the ankle joint.

So what do these injury prevention programs look like? The primary goal is to improve ankle stability via balance/proprioceptive exercises, which are the gold standard for reducing the risk of ankle sprains. Standing on one foot with your eyes open on flat ground is a solid baseline, for which you should be able to balance for 60 seconds without having to catch yourself. If you can do this without much of a challenge, a simple progression is to close your eyes, which will make the exercise significantly more difficult. Our vision is one of three systems to contribute to our sense of balance and typically the one we rely on most. So, when we close our eyes we are down to two systems and are therefore less efficient at maintaining our balance. Once this is mastered, one could advance to performing single leg balance with motion on the opposite side of our body, further challenging our limits of stability. Here is an example:

Single Leg Balance Progression Video

Balance exercises like these can be performed every day in order to reduce the risk of ankle sprains when hiking, backpacking, or trail running. Perform balance exercises barefoot in order to make them more challenging. As always, all exercises should be pain free and you should get approval from a healthcare provider before beginning a new exercise program following an injury. Once cleared, find a safe and quiet place to stand on one leg and test your limits of stability.

-Grant Hennington, DPT