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A Foot Pain can be exacerbated this time of year, with all of our extra festivities like shopping, attending events, and celebrating with friends and family. Each day, a great deal of pressure is placed on your feet. The average person walks between 7,500 to 10,000 steps per day, and the force placed on your feet with every step is two to three times your body weight. Your feet have more than 100 muscles, ligaments and tendons, 26 bones and 33 joints. That’s a lot of components for such a small limb that tolerates so much weight. In this complex body part, many things can cause foot pain. And if you’ve ever experienced pain in your feet, you know that there is little else you can concentrate on.
Home care for your feet
To get you through the holidays, you can do a few at home therapies, such as Epsom salt soaks, foot massages, elevating your feet and legs, wearing shoes with arch support, and getting or giving yourself a good pedicure, which will prevent ingrown toenails and hydrate your skin.
What causes foot pain?
The causes of foot pain are vastly numerous and depend on your specific circumstances. Consulting a physician or podiatric specialist is the best decision for a proper diagnosis and a successful treatment outcome.
The following are a few of the most common issues that can cause foot pain:
Bunions
More women than men experience the painful boney growth on their big toe, known as a bunion, or Hallux Valgus. One of the main causes of a bunion is from wearing shoes that are too tight, too narrow or too high. All of this causes pressure on your toe joint, which in turn starts to ache, become fluid filled and can have boney growths. Uniquely, bunions can also be hereditary and run in families, especially in females, generation after generation. These painful, red, boney, growths can also be caused by a form of arthritis.
There are several options for relieving bunion pain:
Wear wider more comfortable shoes
Use foam or gel pads
Try stretching exercises
Surgery to remove the growth
Gout
Too much uric acid being built up, and then circulating as bodily waste in the blood stream causes gout. It creates tiny needle-shaped crystals that accumulate in the joints and cause excruciating painful swelling. Although gout can cause pain in many parts of the body, often, the first symptom of gout is usually pain and swelling of the toe joint.
Common things that can trigger a flare-up of gout:
Alcohol
Stress
Certain medications
Foods high in Purines (Shellfish, organ meat, sugar)
Symptoms:
Burning, Tingling in the joint
Joint stiffness
Joint swelling and soreness
There are many diets and medications that can help alleviate the painful side effects of gout.
Plantar fasciitis
As mentioned above, the foot is comprised of many different bones, joints, tendons and ligaments these include the plantar fascia. The plantar fascia is a band of tissue similar to ligaments. It stretches from the heel of your foot to the middle, and it is responsible for supporting your arch.
This is one of the most common foot issues; in fact, one in ten people will experience plantar fasciitis at some time in their life. Usually the pain is concentrated in the heel area, and it is normally caused by tiny injuries that occur over a long period of time.
Hammer Toe
When the muscles in your toes get out of balance, they can start contracting into a claw like position. This causes the toe to bend in an upward position in the middle joint of the toe. When this happens, it can create severe pain. Hammertoe can be genetic, and many times occurs in people with either a high arch or a flat foot. Various forms of arthritis can contribute to this issue as well. And unfortunately, ill-fitting footwear can also cause hammertoe, due to pushing the toes out of their normal position for long periods of time.
Treatment:
Padding the toe
Wearing more comfortable shoes
Outpatient surgery (This involves redirecting the lower tendons of the toe to the top of the toe to help straighten it into the correct position)
Mid Florida Foot, Ankle & Vein Clinic provides pain-reducing, comprehensive, cutting-edge treatment. Their podiatrist, Dr. Gabriel Delgado, can treat all foot problems and even performs in-office surgeries. Rest assured you’ll get patient-focused care from their highly skilled and compassionate staff.
To find out more, or to schedule your appointment, please contact Mid Florida Foot, Ankle & Vein Clinic today.
Mid Florida Foot, Ankle & Vein Clinic
Dr. Gabriel F Delgado FACFAS
Lakeland Office
203 Kerneywood St.
Lakeland, FL 33803
Bartow Office
510 West Main St.
Bartow, FL 33830
863-686-1641
midflfootanklevein.com
