Your foot is an amazingly engineered structure, comprising 28 bones, as well as numerous tendons, ligaments, and muscles. These engineering marvels bear your body’s entire weight with every step.
No wonder, then, that foot pain is widespread among men and women in the United States and around the globe. Here in the U.S., about 77% of adults report that they occasionally have foot pain. About half claim that their painful feet restrict their daily activities, such as walking, working, or exercising.
Your foot’s arch is designed to absorb the shocks of everyday activities and exercise, keeping your feet comfortable and moving freely. But if your arch is too high or too low, that could be the root cause of your foot pain.
At Texas Heart and Vein Multispecialty Group, our board-certified podiatrist, Nathaniel Alabi, DPM, wants you to pay attention to your feet, especially your arches. Our team helps you compensate for arches that are too high or too low at our Houston, Texas-area offices.
Are your arches too high, too low, or just right? Here’s how to tell.
The best way to determine if your foot pain traces back to a problem in your arches is to create a footprint. You can do this several ways, but the basic concept remains the same: Step onto a surface that can give you a clearly visible print. Usually, you wet your feet first so the footprint is visible. You can try this by:
Based on how much of your foot you can see in the print, you can easily determine whether your arches are high, low, or normal. These results help you and your podiatrist make adjustments to your foot alignment via customized orthotics that help your arches keep your feet safe and pain-free.
If you can see your entire foot — unbroken — in your footprint, you have low or fallen arches. Low arches are sometimes referred to as “flat feet.”
Low arches offer absolutely no support to your feet. Your plantar fascia — a band of tissue that runs along the bottom of your foot and absorbs shocks — is literally on the ground.
Pain is the most common symptom associated with flat feet. You might also experience swelling along the ankle.
We remedy flat feet with customized orthotics that support your arch and realign your feet. We can even create orthotics that go into your sports shoes to help you run or exercise more comfortably.
If you see most of your foot, but there’s a portion in the inner sole that’s not visible in your footprint, your arches are probably normal. Your arch is high enough that the plantar fascia has room to absorb and rebound as you walk or run.
Normal arches are the least likely to cause foot pain. If you have normal (neutral) arches but still have pain when you walk or run, we may need to conduct imaging studies to find out what causes your discomfort.
If the entire middle of your foot is missing from your print, you have high arches. As with an arch that’s too low, an arch that’s too high can’t do an optimal job of absorbing shocks to your foot.
A high arch means there’s less “real estate” on which your foot can distribute your body’s weight. You may find that your toes or heels take the brunt of the force, which over time can lead to injury and pain.
Because a high arch is less stable than a neutral arch, you may stretch or strain other areas of your foot. Some symptoms and complications of a high arch include:
You’re also more likely to develop tears to your plantar fascia that cause inflammation, a painful condition known as plantar fasciitis. You might also be susceptible to tendinitis and swollen ligaments.
We may recommend custom orthotics to compensate for your high arch. Physical therapy and braces, splints, or casts can also stretch out the tissues of your arch so that it can relax into a healthier position.
What do your footprints tell you about your feet? If you have flat feet, high arches, or foot pain, call us at the office nearest you or schedule an appointment online today.
We service Greater Heights, Pearland Market, League City, Lake Jackson, Manvel, Rosharen, Alvin, Fresno, Missouri City, Arcola, Friendswood, South Houston, Kingwood Market, Humble, New Chaney, Atasciacita, and Northeast Houston, Texas.
