The year is ending, and a brand new year is around the corner. People everywhere are thinking about how they’d like to meet new goals—or fulfill old ones—in the coming months. This is a perfect excuse to start thinking about your foot and ankle health, particularly if you have a stress fracture that needs proper care. Stress fracture healing takes time, but it’s better to rest than allow worse damage to develop. This New Year, how about resolving to let your foot heal the way it needs to?
Stress fractures are small cracks in otherwise solid bone tissue. They develop when your feet grow overworked from repetitive hard impacts. Your muscles and tendons weaken and don’t absorb the shock, so the bones end up damaged instead. The problem is that cracks can widen and worsen under pressure. Your feet are constantly under pressure when you stand or walk, and particularly when you’re running or participating in sports.
You can’t continue being active on a cracked bone an expect it to heal. You need to invest in stress fracture healing. This means taking time to really rest and allow your foot to recover. Take a break from all hard-impact activities and limit how much pressure or weight you put on your injured limb. Wearing a special walking boot or cast may help immobilize your foot so it doesn’t move unnecessarily and aggravate the tissue.
Ice the painful, swollen area to decrease inflammation and edema. Our Carolina Podiatry Group may recommend anti-inflammatory medication to help alleviate some of the discomfort as well. Once the bones have sufficiently recovered, you’ll be able to start physical therapy to begin building back your strength. That way, when you return to your activities, you don’t immediately reinjure your lower limbs.
If you need assistance to recover from a stress fracture or meet other foot health-related New Year’s goals, just contact Carolina Podiatry Group to see how we can help. Use the website to make an appointment with us, or call one of our South Carolina offices: (803) 285-1411 for the Lancaster office, or (803) 548-FEET for the Indian Land location.
