♪ Bob and Brad ♪
♪ The two most famous ♪
♪ Physical therapists ♪
♪ On the internet. ♪
- Hi folks, I'm on Bob Schrupp, physical therapist.
Brad Heineck, physical therapist.
- We're the most famous physical therapists on the internet.
- In our opinion, of course, Bob.
- Today we're gonna talk about the big lie about bowlegs
and how to fix it.
So bowlegs are, when you,
if you stand with your ankles together,
your knees actually bow out like this.
- Yeah, you have a gap between your knees.
Feet are touching and you're unable to bring them in.
- And that's natural.
This is very common in infants and children.
And very often it resolves itself.
- Right.
- I remember a therapist friend who had,
their child had bowlegs, and he goes,
"I was a therapist, I was going to correct it,
but it corrected itself".
- Yeah the growing process, the exercise, weight-bearing,
things a body does very well with that typically.
- So what can cause bowlegs?
Here's some of the causes.
Most common cause is a boney deformity.
So, one thing you could find
is actually the bottom bone here, the tibia,
gets twisted one way or the other.
Quite often out.
And that causes the knee to be actually bowed.
Another common deformity are, not the other common problem,
not real common is Blount's Disease.
- Blount's.
- I never heard of it before Brad. How have you heard it?
But it's a condition founded in children
and affects their growth plates around the knee.
It can cause the growth plate to slow down or speed up
and you can.
- Unevenly on one side to the other
so it creates that that bowleg.
So, what, a bowleg is a slang term.
- Right, very good, Brad.
- Genu, I think is Latin for knee.
- Right.
- Varum is.
- Must be that angle.
- The inward angle, versus genuine verus, which is.
- Right.
So we're not talking about,
when we talk about bowlegs,
we're not talking about this way.
- That would be that knock-kneed.
- Yeah.
- And we did videos on that
and you can fix that sometimes with exercise.
- Right.
- But this one we'll get to that one.
- Okay.
- So Rickets it's is another condition.
- Oh, sure.
You probably haven't heard about that one.
I always remember it was on the ships, right?
People were getting rickets on the ships because they were.
- Lacked vitamin C.
- Vitamin C, D.
- D, oh it was D, I'm sorry.
- And or lack of calcium, so.
And then finally there's Osteomalacia which is soft bones
and it can affect children and adults,
but that's kind of a disease itself too,
that the bones don't contain enough minerals
like calcium or phosphate.
So again, all of our, out of our area, really.
That's not our area.
- And what about just plain genetics?
Does it go from, down in the family, you know?
A boney deformity.
- That'd be the boney deformity.
- Right.
- The big lie, first of all, let's talk about that bread.
You see a lot of videos out there that people say,
these are the exercises to help correct bowlegs.
You really can't.
I mean, you can maybe change it slightly,
but it really can't be changed with exercises.
It can make your muscles or bones stronger,
but they will not change the shape of your bones.
- Right, if you have total knee replacement,
they can correct them often times.
- We'll talk about that.
The only way to change the shape of a bone is to break it
and realign it, so.
- Well with the exception of when you're growing the body,
naturally, like we mentioned.
- Right.
- Can correct itself over years.
- So we're going to give a few things here though,
that may help if you have bowlegs.
- Sure, absolutely.
- Number one,
don't stand with your knees locked into hyperextension.
So this is like a normal standing.
If you bring your legs back like this,
this gives the appearance of more bold, I guess.
And it actually could make your bowlegs worse.
So when you stand,
you should have a slight bend in your knees.
Yeah, Brad, that was a good example right there.
- Yeah, it's hard to demonstrate this one,
your don't have bowleg.
And sometimes I think some people
have a habit of standing on one leg,
and the one leg they have the weight on,
they'll extend back without thinking about it.
And it's one of those things that happens over years
and it can cause.
- Bad for your knees.
- Yeah.
- You don't want to have your knees locked back like that.
Number two, this actually just, I saw a friend like this,
we are golfing and I had picked up on it,
and he goes "I've been having knee pain",
and I go "well, I noticed that your leg,
one leg is bowing out".
And I looked at the bottom of his shoes
and his shoes were all wore out on the outside.
- So along that the pinky toe.
The little toe side.
- Right, that edge there.
Because he already has bowed, bowed knee,
that's making it worse.
- Yeah, so it puts even, yeah.
Exaggerates that and over time, that could be a problem.
So look at your shoes, make sure they're not wearing out.
- And then you would replaced them
and don't let them get too far along
because that will make it, the bowlegged worse.
- Right.
Or you know, make, create pain in your knees
and arthritic problems.
- A real common thing as you get older, I would say Brad,
and I think you would agree,
is the cartilage starts to wear out
on the inside of your knee.
- Right, right.
- And that causes, you know, if you look at this knee,
if I wear out the cartilage on the inside of the knee,
it's going to start bowing like this.
- Right.
- It's just gonna get tilted.
- You know, and actually the person I was referring to,
I'm not going to mention,
she did have an early knee,
partial knee replacement on just one side,
which was not real successful.
And I understand
they're not doing that as much as they used to
for that reason.
Finally, I've had a few patients
who have had so much pain when they're walking
and their knee is just bowing out that we have used a brace,
especially one with metal staves.
I thought they help, you know, I, it gave some relief
and maybe extended the life of the knee a little bit.
- It can help, you know, if you're getting pain,
as you walk, every time you put weight on it,
because of that bowleg, it takes a little stress off,
so that joint pain is tolerable.
- Right.
And the idea, again,
eventually you may need a knee replacement
as Brad alluded to earlier,
and they can straighten out the knee
after a knee replacement.
So, I've seen people go in with two bowlegs and come out,
they're actually taller again because they,
Anything else you want to add, Mr.Heineck?
- Oh, you're talking to me.
No, no, no.
I think we, yeah, we've got, got it well covered.
Exercise, keep your range of motion,
but again, you're not going to change your boney shape,
especially in your adulthood.
- I'm trying to remember the movie,
but there was a Paul Newman movie
and I know he would sing like
"I love going swimming with bowlegged".
- Oh, Bob.
Don't go there.
That's just, the family show.
- It's funny.
- All right, thanks for watching.
(upbeat guitar)