foot orthotics

Is arch support important?

Foot supports are widely used to deal with a variety of biomechanical ailments of the feet and leg. These foot orthotics are inserts which are used in the footwear to attempt to adjust positioning of the feet in a way that they help disorders in the feet and leg. These complaints range from, for example, plantar fasciitis in the heel to medial stress syndrome that can happen in the legs of athletes. All the research evidence shows that the clinical results with foot inserts are usually good and most people that have foot orthotics are happy with them. Nevertheless, foot inserts are only ever be worthwhile if you actually use them. You do need to have appropriate shoes to wear them in and wear them for long enough for the problem they were issued for to get better.

Among the problems with foot inserts is that you simply need to use them in footwear. This may be a dilemma if you don't like wearing shoes or live in a hot environment in which the wearing of footwear is difficult. In these environments people like wearing jandals (known as ‘thongs’ in Australia) which you can simply not use with a foot supports. There are numerous options that are available. Among those is to reduce the time that you are not wearing the foot orthoses, so that you wear footwear with the orthotics enough and don't wear the sandals too much so that the painful problem does not occur. Another option is by using things such as the arch support sandals or jandals like the Archie Thongs from Australia. These have some arch support included in them and can generally be used instead of foot orthoses. Footwear like the Archies will most likely not be as effective as a properly made foot supports, however they could be more than satisfactory to supplement them and use when the proper shoes can't or will not be used.

The foot orthotic lab industry

PodChatLive is the monthly chat show for the regular expert growth of Podiatry practitioners as well as other clincians which might be interested. It is hosted by Ian Griffiths from England in the UK and also Craig Payne from Melbourne in Australia. Craig and Ian stream online each show live via Facebook and after that is soon after edited and submitted to YouTube so that it does get to a diverse audience. Every live episode includes a different person or number of guests to go over a particular area of interest every time. Queries and feedback are generally replied to live by the hosts and guests whilst in the live episode on Facebook. There isn't very much follow up discussion about the YouTube channel. Those of you that enjoy audio only, there is a PodCast version of each episode on iTunes as well as Spotify and the other usual podcast resources for that use. They've already obtained a sizable following which continues getting bigger. PodChatLive can be regarded as one of several ways that podiatry practitioners can usually get totally free professional education points.

One of the episodes that was popular was a discussion with a pair of foot orthotic lab proprietors in regards to the industry and how they interact with the podiatry professions. Foot orthotics labs happen to be in the business of making custom made foot orthotics which Podiatry practitioners make use of for the patients. The laboratory owners in that stream were Artur Maliszewski (from the Footwork Podiatric Laboratory in Melbourne, Australia) and Martin McGeough (from Firefly Orthoses in Ireland). Craig and ian described what every day life is like at the orthoses facilities. They talked briefly on how they individually made the journey from being Podiatrists to lab entrepreneurs and other issues such as their own labs involvement in research. There was also a very helpful conversation about the choices of their customers in relation to negative impression capture approaches such as the plaster of paris vs optical scanning. Also of concern was the number of people even now wish to use the well known “lab discretion” tick on orthoses orders.

Why Podiatrists try to get the right dosing of foot orthotics

The thought of foot orthotic dosing may be having some more awareness in recent times. It is actually in line with the analogy of drugs dose. Everybody who may be on a unique drug or medicine for any medical problem really should on paper be on a specific dosage or amount of that medication. The same needs to be the situation pertaining to foot supports. A unique “dose” of foot orthoses should be applied. Too often foot orthoses are all given the similar dosage of foot supports, especially in clinical studies or research. An episode of the monthly podiatry livestream, PodChatLive  addressed this concern. The hosts of that episode chatted with Simon Spooner in order to focus on some of the constraints of foot orthotics analysis in accordance with the principle. They brought up the way in which clinicians ought to be watching all results from research made in the context of the constraints. They reviewed about what “perfect” foot orthotic research may look like, the points we might need to ‘measure’ and also the apparent discussion between the lab and the clinic. Even more importantly they described what ‘dosing’ is, and the way it may also help us resolve concerns that are at present left unanswered.

Dr Simon Spooner graduated as a Podiatrist in 1991 graduating from the University of Brighton in the UK, and in addition to his BSc in Podiatry, he had been given the Paul Shenton award for his research into callus. Then he continued to finish his PhD in Podiatry from the University of Leicester in 1997, in which he studied the reasons and therapy for inherited foot problems. Simon is now the Director of Podiatry at Peninsula Podiatry. His practice expertise include exercise medicine, foot orthotics, and paediatric and adult foot and gait disorder. Along with his own clinical practice, he has published many research papers on podiatry issues and has delivered lectures at both national and international conventions, and furnished postgraduate education for several National Health Service Trusts.