Hey, it's Dr. Gangemi and in this SockDoc video I want to talk about pronation and actually
overpronation.
A lot of people think that these are the same thing.
Perhaps you've been told that you overpronate when you go to the running store and you've
been getting some shoes to stop that overpronation so you can run again.
The thing with overpronation is you can't actually correct this by giving somebody a
shoe with a supportive device on the inside of your foot.
This only further creates more of an issue.
It creates more of an imbalance, more of instability of the lower leg, which we'll talk about in
a minute why that happens.
Think about it, pronation is the natural movement of your foot.
It's how you lightly touch your heel when you walk and roll in over your big toe.
It's a natural pronation.
And then the opposite is supination, how you recover and your foot, in a way, kind of comes
back in a more rigid stance as you go through your gait cycle.
Its pronation-supination over and over again.
And of course if you're wearing shoes that aren't too thick in the heel and they're more
minimalist or you're running or walking barefoot, you might not even be on that heel at all.
You're probably striking a little bit more towards the midfoot or the forefoot.
And then you're just naturally rolling in over the big toe and pushing off in a normal
nice pronation type motion.
And you're absorbing a lot of shock, as you should.
Your toes will splay naturally.
Your Achilles tendon will naturally elongate and you're absorbing shock and you're springing
yourself forward and you're using a lot of this built up energy, stored energy, in your
foot to make you a much efficient human being, whether you're walking, running or however
you're moving, even jumping, of course.
So, pronation is how we naturally move.
Overpronation is when you roll in too much.
And overpronation, for the most part, comes from the muscle behind your tibia, your tibialis
posterior, that is no longer functioning properly.
I've talked about this muscle several times because it has to do with shin splints.
It has to do with plantar fasciitis.
It has to do even with neuromas.
When people get Morton's Neuroma in their foot.
The tibialis posterior originates behind your tibia and your fibula in your upper leg here,
or I'll say the upper part of your lower leg, wraps around the inside and attaches to all
this interosseous membrane, this thick web-like material that keeps your tibia and your fibula
together, solid and strong, and then wraps down around behind your medial malleolus here,
this bone sticking out, and helps support your medial arch.
That's the major arch of your foot.
So when someone says they or they talk about their arch, whether being flatter or flat
foot or a high arch, they talk about that arch there.
That has a lot to do with the function of your tibialis posterior.
If your tibialis posterior is injured or obviously fatigued, then you're going to overpronate.
You're going to start rolling in more than what you should.
You're not going to absorb shock properly.
You're going to lose that spring-like ability.
You're going to absorb shock in your knees and your hips and all the way up even up your
entire spine to your neck.
The way to correct that is through those trigger points.
I talked about how to do that on the SockDoc site, where to find them and how to do that.
And also, to actually regain the health of your foot it's to actually lose the shoes
to some degree.
Start working more towards more minimalist.
Get out of the thick heeled shoes that are going to create instability and mobility problems
in your lower leg.
The more your foot has contact with the ground, the stronger your foot will be, the stronger
your body will be.
You can start to develop these natural motions again.
You can start to develop and regain the strength in your feet, in your toes, in your lower
leg, in your entire body, really.
Sometimes the tibialis posterior is fatigued for other reasons, has to do with certain
stresses in your body.
Again, more information on that on the SockDoc site, but this video's pretty much about why
you want to reconsider overpronation or anti-pronation type shoes and where the pronation aspect
of your body really comes from, where it's developed, and how you end up with overpronation
and why that's a symptom not a cause of a problem.
Overpronation means that something else is off, that you need to correct it.
You don't want to just support that overpronation with anything, including an orthotic, of course.
Many people know that I'm anti-orthotics for big reasons, as talked about on the SockDoc
site.
Hey, speaking of, lots of new videos on the SockDoc site.
Brand new site's up.
More articles coming out.
There's lot of information there on health, fitness, training, injury prevention, all
natural injury treatment and preventions, shoe reviews, other health topics like asthma
and sleep issues.
So check us out, come back often.
Hope you enjoyed the video and see you next time.
Thanks.