- Hi, folks. I'm Bob Schrupp, Physical Therapist.
- Brad Heineck, Physical Therapist.
- And we are the most famous physical therapists
on the internet. - In our opinion,
of course, Bob.
- Morton's neuroma!
Three instant pain relief options at home,
from a real patient.
- Say no more, Bob.
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- Right. Yeah, I mean--
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All right. Morton's neuroma.
You know, we studied this at school a little bit,
and I don't see a lot of patients with it--
- No, I don't either. - Right. But I have,
and these--
- But you have it.
- And then, it happened to me--
- Oh, you have had some patients.
- Yeah, I've had some patients with it,
and I've had it myself.
And it was nice,
'cause I've actually had it after--
- Seeing some patients.
- No. I had it, and then I saw some patients.
- Oh, I see. - I was ready.
- I was loaded to just give them the information.
So, what is Morton's neuroma?
I didn't look up to see who Mortonー
if Morton is a doctor.
- I'm sure he is.
- Yup. But, if you, on the bottom of your foot,
between your third and fourth metatarsal,
the red spot indicates where,
and there's actually a nerve, or nerve bundle, in there,
that, when it gets squished, and tightened up,
like in a tight shoe, it could create pain,
and it can be really painful!
If you've gotー
the worst I've ever had, and I was bicycling,
and I didn't have my shoe fitted yet.
It was a 50 mile bike ride.
By mile 30, it hurt like crazy.
I couldn't stop, because I was racing!
- Even though you're really not putting full weight on it.
- No. No.
But it was just tight, and I was pedaling.
It felt like someone took a vise-grip on it,
and just locked it on really tight,
and it just hurt like crazy.
- So, did that hurt more than walking on it?
- Uh.
Well, that did. - It was a lot similar?
- No, that hurt more,
because I was such a long time.
Normally, if you're walking, you stop--
- You give some relief to it. - Right,
'cause when you take the pressure off,
whether it's from a tight shoeー
it could be from a tight shoe.
It can be from high heels,
where you put pressure on.
- That makes sense. - I don't wear high heels,
so I can't speak directly for that, butー
and also, you know, the tight shoes.
My ski boots do the same thing. I don't know why.
Bike shoes, ski boots;
they're less forgiving, I guess.
- And by the way, he used a marker to make this mark.
That's not inflamed, or anything like that.
- Exactly. Right.
Take the pressure off.
Typically feels very good, immediately.
So, how you're gonna take care of this problemー
oh, there is one technical way to test this,
although, on me,
it's called Mulder's sign. - Mulder's test.
Sign? - Yeah. Sign.
Where you grab the foot, like this,
and you squeeze and release.
When you squeeze,
if it hurts, or makes a clicking sound with associated pain,
it's positive.
Me, negative.
- No clicking sound, either? - No.
However, when I put a shoe on that's a little tight,
and I walk, I could feel the click,
and it hurts. - Okay.
- So, my Mulder's sign is negative.
So, these signs that we have--
- They're always at 100% correlation.
- Right. Exactly.
- But, it's interesting,
because the shoe basically acts as Mulder's sign.
- Right.
- Because it clicks, and it hurts.
- Right. Exactly. Exactly.
So, they're waiting, Bob.
They're waiting for what are the easy, quick solutions.
I'm gonna give you an example:
this is a bike shoe, that, actually,
that I had all the pain with.
And so, what I did with this one,
is, on the bottom of the insoleー
I just took the insole out,
and you're gonna see what I did here.
I taped in some pads,
that go on the foam-- - Oh, two pads in there.
- Yeah. I actually put two pads,
'cause one wasn't enough.
I put a pad in there,
I tape it in,
and then, you put it in, and put the shoe on,
and walk around on it.
And you're gonna feel very clearly
if it's in the right spot.
If the pad is too high,
and it's hitting that neuroma area,
it's gonna hurt.
- So it is, definitelyー
you don't want it to hit that area.
- No. - It's not,
spread the forces out on that area.
It's actually to transfer it to the arch.
- Right. So, you're transferring it here.
So, it pressures here,
away from the nerve bundle.
The pressure is here,
and relieves it here.
And that's what I actually have, here.
And there'sー
I don't know any specific formula to put the exactー
how much, how thick it is.
- [Bob] I'm sure it's gonna vary from person to person.
- [Brad] And per your shoe.
- [Bob] So, this is allー
always, this is an experiment.
- Right. - Give it a try.
Figure it out.
There's certainly no harm in doing this.
- [Brad] Right. If it doesn't work,
you haven't lost anything,
but I should've started this the other way,
'cause the easier way than doing this, is actually,
sometimes, if you just take the insert out,
it's gonna give you a little more room in your shoe.
- And sometimes, that's enough.
- Just having enough space in there.
It all depends. Is it being irritated,
because the shoe is too tight,
or just because of the pressure on there?
If it's from being the shoe too tight,
taking the insert out may beー
and actually, I've got a new pair of bike shoes, right now,
that I'm fitting,
and with that one, I took my shoe spreader,
which I've used, because of my Morton's neuroma.
So, if you have Morton's neuroma--
- Some type of shoe stretcher, shoe spreader.
- Yup. You could purchase one of these,
'cause you may need it, you know,
on a number of your new shoes
over the rest of your life.
And you put it in there, and you crank it down,
and you leave it overnight.
With mine, I did itー
I went as wide as it would go, and left it overnight.
It got better, but it wasn't good enough.
So, I put, actually,
a really thick winter sock, on there.
Put it in there.
Stretched it a little bit more, for another night,
and that made a difference.
So, on that shoe, I take the insert out,
and I stretched it,
and then, I didn't have to put in--
- The pads. - The pads.
Yep. The metatarsal pads.
- It was fine, then. - Right.
So, you got two options that way.
And I said three.
The third one is, if you wear high heels,
and it's putting pressure on there,
don't wear high heels.
I'm sorry. - Yeah, you're gonna have to
hold off, especially if you got things irritated.
- Yeah. 'Cause the metatarsal pad is not gonna work
with that angle. I mean, you could try it and see,
but I doubt it's gonna work.
- So, Brad, did you invent this?
- Invent?
- I mean, did you see this anywhere,
or did you just try this on your own?
- You know, I can't remember!
My memory isーand it was about 10 years ago
when I did this shoe.
I looked. I did some research on it,
so I don't think I invented it, Bob.
I'm pretty sure it was...
Yeah, someone else has been doing this for a while.
- I know some people are going to say,
"This is reallyーthis is podiatrist,"
but, you know, this works.
- Right. - So, you know.
And it's not invasive. - Right.
- So, I think it's really worth a try.
- Right.
Here are some pads-- - Metatarsal pads.
- I just picked these up at a shoe store.
You could cut 'em up, to fit,
and they got a little sticky thing on the back.
But you don't have to do this.
This route. Although, you can see what you can find online,
or just, you know, a felt would work.
You just have to play around with it--
- A piece of carpet, maybe?
- Yeah. You could try aー
probably not a really thick carpet.
- No, no. - Not shag, but, you know,
probably the outdoor carpet variety,
that you have laying around,
or just cut a hole in your carpet, in the living room.
- There we go. (Brad laughs)
You'd be loved by your spouse. - Yes.
Anyways, seriously.
It's a really nice option to work,
and when you get it right,
it takes the pain away very quickly.
No meds needed. It's simply mechanical.
- So, do you feel it walking, or not?
- Oh yeah. If my shoe is too tight.
I had a pair of work shoes I had to do this to.
- Okay. - And it was very irritating.
- Soーand you mean work shoes, as far as boots?
- No. They're a pair of work shoes--
- Just regular? - Yeah. Like this.
- Like this. - Yeah. These.
In the clinic. - Okay.
- They're a nice pair of ECCOs.
They're expensive, too.
- Sure. - They felt fine in the store.
I spend a couple hundred bucks on 'em,
and it was like, "They're gonna last me a long time,"
and, well, they hurt,
so I fixed it with this. - You stretched it out.
- Yeah. They worked out good.
- All right. Give it a try. - Good luck with your boys.
- And put your comments below.
Let us know what's been working for you on this.