That stabbing heel pain first thing in the morning is frustrating enough. But when every pair of shoes you own seems to make it worse, it becomes overwhelming. Patients from Ranelagh and across South Dublin tell us this all the time. They have tried rest, they have tried stretches, yet the pain keeps returning. Often, … Read more
Most people never think about their shoes until something hurts. By then, the damage is already underway. Patients visiting our Blackrock and South Dublin clinics often arrive frustrated because their foot pain keeps returning despite treatment. When we look at their footwear, the reason becomes clear within seconds. Shoes that looked fine in the shop … Read more
Your feet keep a fairly accurate record of what you’ve been putting them in.
Corns, calluses, blisters, damaged nails and gradually changing toe shape are not random. They form where pressure and friction repeat, and pressure and friction repeat where a shoe doesn’t match the foot inside it.
Which means you can read the problem backwards. Find the mark, work out what’s causing it, and you’ve usually identified the shoe feature that needs to change.
Here is an uncomfortable figure to start with.
A systematic review of the literature on footwear fitting found that between 63% and 72% of participants were wearing shoes that did not accommodate either the width or the length dimensions of their feet.
Not shoes they disliked. Not shoes that were merely uncomfortable. Shoes that physically did not match the feet inside them.
The same review found that incorrect fitting was associated with foot pain and with foot disorders including lesser toe deformity, corns and calluses. In certain groups the width problem was worse still — with somewhere between 46% and 81% wearing footwear that was too narrow.
That pair of shoes you wear every day might be causing more problems than you realise. Patients visiting our Stillorgan and surrounding area clinics often discover their footwear sits at the heart of their foot pain. Shoes that look fine can quietly create stress on tissues that were never designed to handle it. This post … Read more
You have tried rest. You have tried stretching. You might even have bought new insoles. But your foot pain keeps coming back. What if the problem has been on your feet the whole time? At Foot Focus Podiatry, we see this pattern constantly. Patients across Dublin spend money on treatments while wearing shoes that work … Read more
