♪ Bob and Brad, ♪
♪ The two most famous, ♪
♪ physical therapists ♪
♪ on the internet. ♪
- Hi folks. I'm Bob Schrupp, physical therapist.
- Brad Heineck, physical therapist.
- And together, we are the most famous physical therapist,
on the internet.
- In our opinion, of course, Bob.
- All right, Brad, today, we're gonna talk about
one minute plantar fasciitis exercises,
that you can do.
And tips for-
And believe it or not, studies have shown
that they get 83% of the people, this ends up in a cure.
- Okay. - May take one to two months.
But if you just do these stretches alone,
83% of the people got better.
- Okay, great.
- Or got cured.
But we don't want just 83%.
We want more, Brad.
So we're gonna show you some other things
that you can do in additional to that.
- Right, supplements.
- That will help out.
And the studies have shown that.
These are all based on scientific studies.
So we- - Okay
- We're not just making it up.
- No, we don't even-
By the way, if you're new to our channel,
please take a second to subscribe to us.
Our subscribe button is here, left of Brad-
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- Say no more.
- All right, let's start off
with the stretches, Brad.
Easy to do.
There's a lot of different ways you can do 'em.
- Sure. - Let's start off with the,
probably one of the simple ways to do
is actually just when you wake up in the morning-
And by the way,
before you get outta bed in the morning,
you do wanna put shoe on or slippers on.
You don't wanna walk, you know
the band has been tightening up all night long.
- Right. - And when you step on it,
that's when you get that, owie, owie pain.
- Right. The tissues tighten up overnight,
and if you step on it
they just stretch really quick and it hurts.
- All right. I took my sock off
just so you can see better.
I know things are kind of gnarly.
- Yeah. This is not pretty- - But, you're gonna basically
grab the forefoot here
and you're gonna stretch the toe
and the foot at the same time.
Do you see how I'm doing that, Brad?
- Yep. So he's extending all the toes.
- Yep. I'm pulling the toes like this,
'cause the plantar fascia does extend into the toes
through the tendons.
And I'm also pulling the foot.
- So yeah, pulling that ankle up
and all the tissues under in here.
You're gonna feel that stretch.
And you may not be able to do this really quick.
(finger snaps) You may have to work into it.
- Yeah. You might have to work into it.
You may even do a little bit of pressure on pressure off.
- Yep.
- Pressure on pressure off.
All this is gonna, again, get you prepared
for taking that first step in the morning.
And this is a great stretch.
You can do it throughout the day.
I mean, you could literally do this every hour, Brad.
- Do you have to take your shoe off, though, Huh?
- Well, no. We're gonna show you some variations.
- Oh, Okay, good.
Let's say you're sitting in a chair, Brad.
And cause that is what a lot of times people find
is that after they've been sitting for a while
and then they get up, ow.
- Yeah, yeah
- And it's like you're re-tearing
those tissues again. So-
- You want to go after it slowly and a little more gently.
- Right.
So what you can do-
and you can have your shoe on in doing this,
but again I'm gonna have it off
just so you can see better.
You can just put your foot back like this, Brad.
And again, I'm stretching a toe
and I'm leaning forward like this.
- Yep.
So right in here you can see,
especially the the great toe,
or the big toe, is getting the most extension and so on.
But you you'll feel it.
This is one of those stretches you're gonna feel.
- And then if you really wanna get a little crazy, Brad,
you can actually go down all the way like this.
- [Brad] Yep.
- [Bob] And stretch like that.
- [Brad] Right. This is something you work into.
Use good judgment.
And you know, let your body talk to you.
- Now you can- - Listen to it.
- [Bob] Yeah. Now you can do it on a mat like this too.
Do you wanna show that one, Brad?
- [Brad] Sure.
- [Bob] Well, you got that on so can't show that.
- [Brad] Yeah, yeah, I can't show you.
I got one of the other props on
that's gonna help you with this.
- So here's another way, another variation.
You're gonna get the toe up like this.
- Let's get this out the way, Bob
- So I'm like this, Brad.
Right.
- Look at that leg, right. - And then I can put my knee
like this and I can just lean back onto it. Right?
- Right. Yep.
- So even go like this. - Yep.
- Right? - Well, yeah.
(both laughing)
- He's asking me? - I'm getting very,
you know, I want- - Yeah he wants-
- Clarification here- - Confirmation
by the bystander.
But yeah, right in here
we're looking at this stretch, right in here.
Stretching that plantar fascia.
It's all in the bottom of the foot.
- That really stretches things, Brad.
- Yeah. - Now in, in order-
you want the whole chain stretched too.
So you're gonna go ahead and stretch the calf muscle too.
And you wanna show that, Brad,
- sure.
- On this right here.
- So when he is talking about the whole chain
we look at the tissues of the plantar fascia
connects to the heel,
the heel connects to the calf muscles and Achilles tendon.
That's all part of the chain.
So stretch it all.
- [Bob] Now you can do this with a wall stretch
or you can, if you have an incline board,
these work out really nice.
- [Brad] These are nice.
And you're gonna,
it's more comfortable, and they just work here.
You can relax.
Now, if you look at my leg
here, go ahead.
I'll oh, I got, my sock is not tight.
There we go.
Look at that, we don't have the stripes.
Now, if you look at the leg,
I got my knee fully extended.
That stretches the gastrocnemius.
It's a little higher to the knee.
Then I'm going to bend it, bend the knee
and then stretch forward.
And then you get a deeper stretch down in here.
- [Bob] It gets the soleus too.
- [Brad] Yep.
Which by the way is good for shin splints.
So you're getting two birds with one stone, here.
- [Bob] Right. - [Brad] Okay.
- [Bob] Now if you don't have a slant board
you can, you know, lean up against the wall like this
and do it with the leg straight
and also with the leg bent.
- [Brad] Right.
Right in here, - So that's a-
we're getting the stretch - another variation.
back in here.
- [Bob] You can also do this on the edge of a step.
I mean, holding onto the railings
and just-
- Sure. - Lower your foot off, you're
- You're gonna hold these stretches,
typically 15 to 30 seconds.
That's a long time when you're stretching.
- Again, well within that minute, like I said,
this doesn't take long, everybody's busy.
They don't have time for these.
So these are things you can intersperse
throughout the day.
Throw these stretches in
and it only takes 30 seconds to a minute.
- Right.
- And you're on your way.
The other thing you wanna try
is you wanna-
now those are all the stretches,
and those alone,
if you keep doing them on a daily basis,
should decrease or cure your pain
within a couple months, well, a month or two.
- And that may seem to some people
like that's a really long time,
but plantar fascitis
- Can last a year.
- Yes.
I've had people that just,
it's a chronic thing
and they think it's never gonna go away.
So this is reasonably good for this.
- Well, you really don't want to
give up on it too, either Brad.
- Right? - I think people,
they start doing these stretches
and they go,
"Well, he said it was gonna help, and it's a week later."
It's like, it can take a couple weeks-
- before you start seeing some relief.
- Sure.
And maybe a few more before it's gone.
But we're gonna help you move it along even quicker.
The other thing you can try
is a deep friction massage.
- Ah, yes.
- So again, I should-
feet are dirty here, Brad, but
- No, Bob, your feet, why?
- So, You know,
- The plantar fascia- - Here.
- runs from like the heel
and up into the toes here.
So you can just take your two thumbs, Brad,
and if this is too tender to handle it
you might start up here first.
And you're just gonna do a splayed massage.
Which in other words,
I'm taking the thumbs together
and then I'm pulling 'em apart
while I'm going deep into the tissues.
- Yeah. And he's pushing hard.
It's hard, might be hard to see on the camera,
but your thumbs are gonna get tired within,
doing this after a couple minutes, for sure.
- So you can, and then eventually
hopefully you can work down to this area,
hopefully it'll be able to tolerate it.
- And he is talking about often times
or most of the time
right in this area,
I'm gonna mark on you, Bob.
This is the area, if you push in with your thumb
or your finger
it's gonna send you through the roof.
- [Bob] Yeah.
- [Brad] Because it's that's where that fascia attaches.
- If you wanna diagnose whether or not you have it or not,
that's usually the spot right in here.
That's the tender spot, so.
This massage you can do every day.
You can do it a minute at a time.
And especially if you do it every day,
or you can do it a couple times a day.
- Sure. And if your boss asks you
why you're at work and got your shoes off,
and you just tell him we told you to.
- Yeah.
- It's gonna help you out. - Well, send 'em to our site.
(Brad laughing)
- All right.
The other thing that only takes-
can do in a minute, Brad, is you can do an ice massage.
- Sure.
- Just to give yourself some quick relief.
Cheers.
- Oh, thank you, Bob.
- So you're gonna get a styrofoam cup.
You're gonna fill it with water.
You're gonna put it in the freezer and let it freeze.
And then you're gonna go ahead
and tear off just the top of it.
So that it's gonna be looking like a snow cone.
The ice gonna be sticking out a little bit.
- The frozen ice will be there.
If you put this in the freezer, don't put it in the door,
and then your wife goes over and opens it quick.
And the water spills out, it's not frozen.
That doesn't work out good, Bob
- I bet you that doesn't work out good.
Okay. The other thing you can do that is
just put your palm on it and warm it up a little bit.
Smooth it out.
- Yeah.
- And then you just go ahead
and put it on the foot and it doesn't take long.
Does it, Brad?
- It's gonna cool down pretty quickly.
- Right.
Usually, I find that that first minute is not real fun
'cause it's such a shocker.
but then you start to get,
you go through kind of a bitey stage,
and then it gets numb and then you know you're done.
- Right. So
- What about the one where you take the pop bottle?
Drink the pop.
- Oh yeah, that's right - Or just
- Pour it down the sink,
you're probably better off.
Fill it up with water almost to the top and freeze it.
And then at that point,
this was not a pop bottle
but go ahead and put your foot on there, Bob.
And you have a frozen, basically a frozen round ice cube.
- And you can roll it like this.
- Yeah. - Roll it.
- So you get a little bit of massage almost and
and it's cooling down at the same time.
- Exactly.
- So again, another little variation of there that you can.
- That one is less pain or less irritating than the cold,
plus it doesn't make the wet mess.
- The other thing that we would highly recommend,
if things aren't getting better
or if you want to move things along,
is to get a night splint.
- Right.
- My wife, we had tried a lot of these things
and it was progressing really slow.
She got very quick relief from a night splint.
- Did you do the massage on her foot
or did you make her do it to herself?
- I mean,
- I did it at one point- - You didn't do it?
- in the past. In the past. I did it
- When you were dating or something.
- Yeah.
(both laughing)
- Show the night splint, Brad.
- Okay. If you get up in the morning
and that first step is very painful
this is a really good idea.
- Yeah.
- I have this already put on, but it's just a-
and you want this,
these are, this is only rigid on the top,
has a plastic shell, so to speak,
that goes over top of your foot.
On the bottom of the foot is just elastic.
Different ones are different.
- Yeah. I'm not gonna recommend one over the other.
- Sure. - The only thing I do like
is that if they have some feature like this,
that pulls the foot up.
- Yeah.
- And tightens.
- So I'm gonna pull this up.
Hopefully you can see this.
- And it has to be comfortable, Brad,
'cause you won't be able to get to sleep.
I know my wife had it too tight one night
and she had to loosen it up because it just,
you know, you want a slight stretch
but you don't want it so hard that you can't sleep.
- So when she did that, did that wake you up, Bob?
- No.
Good.
- I'm a pretty sound sleeper, but again,
you know, again, this is just one case I'm talking about
It was my wife, but it was shocking how well this worked.
- Sure. - I mean she went from
having pain to not having pain in a week.
- Yeah. - I mean
it really made a difference.
- Yeah. You know, the cost varies,
you know, I'm not sure, $30 to $50.
You'd have to look 'em up on the internet for night splints.
But the whole key is,
it keeps your foot in a neutral position.
Cause normally when you sleep,
your foot is down plantar flex-
- And things are tightening up.
- Yep. For, you know, 6, 7, 8 hours,
those tissues tighten up
and then you put the weight on it
and they stretch really quickly
and it irritates them and can tear 'em again.
This keeps them,
and they start to heal in that stretch position.
You go to that weight bearing,
and you don't have that automatic big pull on those tissues.
- So, hopefully some of these things will help
and remember Brad and I can fix just about anything.
- Except for this
(paper tearing)
- (both) The broken heart
- But we're working on it.
Don't worry.
- Oh my God, Bob.