- Have you been experiencing pain
on the bottom of your feet?
Well, you may be suffering from plantar fascitis.
- That's right. Now, this is a common condition.
There's a number of causes for this
that you may not be aware of.
We're gonna cover them all and get right into it.
You're gonna find out there's more than you really wanted
to know, but it's gonna help you out.
(upbeat music)
- Like many health problems, we wanna find the root cause
of your plantar fascitis pain and try to solve it.
- That's right, and the experts have it narrowed down
to three primary causes, number one is your footwear.
It needs to be changed, number two is the calf muscle
in this complex, there's some treatment for that,
as well as your walking habits.
Are you walking properly?
- So in this video, we're gonna address why each
of these things can cause your foot pain and how to fix it.
- Excellent job, Mike. I'm excited.
- So problem number one, according to Dr. Ray McClanahan,
who is a podiatrist, the big reason your plantar fascitis
isn't going away is probably your footwear.
- That's right, if you look at the majority
of footwear made, it looks very nice.
However, the toe box, which is right here, is oftentimes
a majority of times, pointed like a V.
And what happens is, your toes get crunched up in there
and they really get smushed, if you will, or compressed.
And what that does, it can cut circulation that's critical
and is gonna cause problems without that blood flow.
- So when your footwear is too narrow,
like Brad is gonna demonstrate in my foot,
it is gonna compress your toes together.
And this is gonna reduce the blood flow
from the arteries going to your feet that innervate
into the plantar fascia underneath here.
If you're not getting blood flow to that area, over time,
it's gonna start to degenerate and not repair itself.
So this is actually known as plantar fasciosis,
and that is what is causing a lot of your pain down here.
- And again, I just wanna emphasize that blood flow.
Everyone in the medical field is so aware
of healthy blood flow equals healthy tissues.
And if we starve the tissues of blood,
there's gonna be problems and that's what happens
with plantar fascitis. - Additionally,
that problem is what causes bunions.
So if you have bunions, you also wanna look
at a different shoe.
- Well that's another video, isn't it?
- We're getting into this next.
So, the solution for this is to find a shoe
that has a wide toe box, there are many varieties,
but if you look at this old shoe of Bob's,
it has a narrow toe box, this is going to squish your feet
together, decrease the blood supply to your plantar fascia,
which will lead to chronic pain on the bottom of your feet.
So, first step is to find a good shoe with a wide toe box.
The next thing you wanna look at is the heels on your shoes.
So, an elevated heel like this one is gonna put more stress
on your calf muscles, which we'll talk about later,
and a zero drop shoe will not cause these problems.
Now, there's a big difference between a minimalist shoe
like this and a zero drop like this.
They're both zero drop, the heel and the toe
are all the same height, but there's not much cushioning
on the bottom of this shoe, which can be problematic
for some people, so it's okay to still have cushioning
underneath there, just try to buy one at zero drop.
- Right, and if you're not familiar with these terms,
it's one of those things that, you know,
look it up some more so you're very clear on it.
I know I just bought some shoes over the weekend and I went
to a store 'cause I'm old-fashioned
and actually had some salespeople
that were very knowledgeable and we could communicate
exactly what I wanted and they were good.
- And another cheaper option that Brad has,
that Dr. Ray McClanahan recommends, is also Crocs.
They're technically a zero drop and have a wide toe box.
- Yeah, and they're a lot cheaper in general,
you can use 'em for anything.
Swim in, walking through the yard, gardening,
up and down the steps, you can even take your grandkids out
and take your dog out for a walk.
And if you step in the doodoo, easy to wash 'em off,
throw 'em in the sink, wash 'em up and leave 'em dry.
You can do that 172 times, no problem.
- Now, if your toes are scrunched up
even when you take your shoe off,
what can work is some type of toe spreader.
So I have the Correct Toes here.
These are actually Dr. Ray McClanahan's brand he works with.
They're very nice, you can wear 'em while you're walking.
Simply put 'em in like this and you can put your socks
over it in your shoes and it'll help keep 'em spaced out.
- There are other toe spreaders, you can buy them,
they're larger, they'll spread
a little bit more aggressively, but because of their size,
you cannot wear 'em comfortably in a shoe.
And that's okay, you can simply stretch 'em out,
wear 'em around the house with, you know, bare feet.
And I think that's what Bob's wife is doing
and she's having good success with that.
- And my dad, who is 69 years old, is also doing this
and he's having great success as well.
He has a really bad bunion but doesn't bother him anymore.
- Really? - Yeah.
- Did he use this kind or did he use the big ones?
- These exact ones. - Dr. McCallahan?
- McClanahan. - I'm sorry, Dr. McClanahan.
- So the second common cause of plantar fascitis
is tight calf muscles, so Brad, do you wanna explain why?
- Right, so the calf muscles are absolutely
directly connected to the plantar fascitis.
And I'll explain that with this little demonstration.
The black tape represents the plantar fascitis here,
I have it cut off here, but it actually goes up
a little farther, cross the foot, now it connects
up directly to the heel and the calf muscle connects
up directly to the opposite side of the heel
or the calcaneus bone.
So when you stretch this, if I go like this,
not only am I stretching my plantar fascitis,
but I'm stretching that calf.
If this calf muscle or this whole muscle tendon unit
becomes tight, direct influence
on this plantar fascitis tissue, it's gonna be a problem.
So we stretch this, loosen it up,
give some freedom to that plantar.
- Yeah, so when that calf is tight,
it creates the plantar fascia to be tight,
which eventually can cause some micro-tears
in the area down there, if you're chronically having
these micro-tears, it's gonna become inflamed,
which eventually results in plantar fascitis.
- Yep, and that's where that continual, you know,
week after week, month after month pain can result
and people just get so frustrated and actually depressed.
- So, we're gonna give you some solutions for that.
So the first solution, like we mentioned earlier,
is to get a shoe with zero drop.
So what that means is, the heel is the same height
as the forefoot, if you look at this shoe,
the heel is elevated, this is how most shoes are.
Brad's gonna demonstrate how this affects
your calf muscles here.
- Right, so if we look down here,
the shoes I'm wearing are zero drop.
So, I'm going to put a little block there to simulate
if I had a normal pair of shoes elevating my heel, you know,
half-inch or so, and the tendon right here,
or the calf muscle, you can see is on slack.
Okay, and it'll start to tighten down that way,
which puts pressure and tighten us all the way
to the plantar, now if I pull that out
and put my zero drop shoes in, watch what happens
right here to that tendon.
Things pull up and they tighten.
So you get a little bit of a stretch
and that's gonna eliminate that chronic tightness
just from walking around with a zero drop shoe.
And that's without doing stretches.
So it's kind of a easier way to, sorry about that,
to stretch it out, I get my cameras mixed up.
- Okay, the second solution if you have tight calf muscles
is to wear a night splint, so you only wear this at night
when you are in bed or I guess if you're laying down
for a prolonged period of time, you can as well.
So when you sleep commonly with your bedsheets on,
however you sleep, on your back, stomach or side,
most of the time, you sleep like my left foot is here.
It is pointed down like that, that is gonna put more stress
on the calf muscles and possibly cause plantar fascitis
over time. - You know, I don't want
to interrupt, Mike, but I do wanna mention,
if you have symptoms of getting out of the bed
in the morning and you've experienced this, oh,
and it hurts like crazy, those first few steps,
and it works itself out after a few steps
or a couple minutes of walking, then the night splint
is more indicated and I would recommend that.
We've had people have good luck with this
if that happens when you get outta bed in the morning.
- So what you do is, you just put the night splint on,
you get it in a position like this, it's not super tight.
I'm not stretching right now. It feels comfortable.
But it's gonna let me prevent from going down like this.
My foot is always staying in a neutral position,
keeping that calf muscle in this area,
not being overly stretched when it's plantar flexed
like this, so this can help relieve some
of that tight calf muscles.
And the good thing about it is, you just stretch it
while you're sleeping. - Yeah, it's easy.
You find this pretty comfortable 'cause this is yours,
you wear this. - This is mine, yes,
'cause I have a tight calf and ankle muscle, I wear.
You're gonna start slow, build up.
I commonly put it on when I fall asleep.
If I wake up in the middle of the night and my calf
is really tight and bothering me, I'll take it off
for a while and then maybe I'll put it back on later.
Otherwise, you can go to bed without it.
If you wake up to use the restroom, put it on then.
I personally found when I'm sleepy like that,
I won't put it on, so I put it on right when I go to bed.
- Right, so having it on for half the night
is a lot better than? - Nothing at all.
- Nothing at all, and eventually maybe work it up
to the full night's sleep.
- Yeah, over time, sometimes I can wear it all night long,
doesn't bother me, but sometimes it's a little problematic.
- Are you having success with your treatment?
- I'm having some success, yes, but it takes a while.
- But again, yours is not plantar fascitis.
- Mine's not calf-related. Mine's a ankle injury.
- Yeah, that's a different story.
All right, now the third thing to address
is your walking style, or we call it gait
in the therapy world, and this is something
that's not hard to do with short increments,
but it takes a while to form this habit.
It's gonna take stress off of your plantar fascitis,
your calf muscles, actually your joints
and your hips and your back as well.
So it's generally a healthier way to walk,
we call it walking with a soft knee.
First, we're gonna show the typical way people walk.
It's called a heel strike. Mike, can you demonstrate?
Okay now, when you walk forward, typically
the ankle comes up, we call that dorsiflexion.
The heel strikes first, the knee is fully locked out.
And what happens there, there's a lot of impact right there.
That goes all the way up to the joints, taking stress
on the joints as well as the plantar fascitis
and the heel or the. - [Mike] Calf muscles.
- Calf, yeah. Thank you, boy, I was stuck there
for a second, now, how you want to change that is go ahead,
we're gonna swing forward in your forefoot,
not your toes, but your forefoot.
Now, Mike's exaggerating here a little bit.
When I walk like this, I kind of come down.
There isn't much there, I think, at least that's the way
my mind sees it, I should take a video of it.
But the forefoot accepts the weight.
There's a little give there, it's not like your heel banging
into the ground and look at the knee, slightly flexed.
And that takes that impact off of the hips
and the joint as well as the whole leg.
So when we say soft knee walking,
that's how that got its name.
But everything else here happens.
Mike, can you demonstrate with a typical heel strike
for a few steps, why don't you back up a little bit
so we get it in the camera, and heel strike.
And this is typical, if you think about that heel striking
into the surface, particularly a hard surface,
that's gonna take its toll and it does take its toll
on people's joints, plantar fascitis, hips, back, et cetera.
Now, demonstrate the proper soft knee technique.
Whoa, it's soft. It's soft.
- So, when you do a soft knee technique or walking
on your forefoot, you're gonna have to take shorter strides
or distance with each step.
It feels a little awkward at first to get accustomed to it,
but over time, you'll start to get acclimated.
This is much easier to initially try barefoot
or maybe some slippers in the house versus a normal shoe.
If your shoe still has a tall, elevated heel,
it's gonna be kind of problematic yet.
- Now, if you do have plantar fascitis and it's painful,
try walking like this in your house and you are more
than likely gonna experience walking normally, painful.
Walking with the soft knee, sorry, the soft knee
as we just demonstrated, will reduce the pain.
Then you know you want to continue really to work
on that change in your gait or your soft knee walking.
All right, as I mentioned at the beginning of this video,
we were gonna give you a lot of information and we did,
and we're taking it from Dr. McClanahan.
He's an expert at it, so you may not wanna do all
of these solutions, but pick out a few,
but work through 'em, they're gonna work out for you.
So, we wanna get you back on your feet. No pun intended.
That didn't go, did it? - Not quite.
Anyway, if you wanna find more resources
from Dr. Ray McClanahan, we will link some videos we did
with him in the top comment there.
We had one on plantar fascitis, a whole podcast on all sorts
of feet problems, and we'll also link his website,
which has good resources if you wanna read more information
about your specific problem.
He gets much more detailed than us on this.
- Right, right, again, he knows what he is talking about
from years of experience with his patients and personally.
- Yes. - It's a great story.
(upbeat music)
(upbeat music ends)