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When I see patients in my office with heel pain, most assume that they have a heel spur. My name is Dr. Andrew Schneider, and I'm a podiatrist in Houston, TX. While that may or may not be true, the heel spur rarely is the cause of pain. Your pain is most likely caused by plantar fasciitis In today's video. I'm going to discuss how they tell the difference between pain from a heel spur and plantar fasciitis. I'll also share some effective home remedies to get you feeling better.

When I show my patients their xray when they come in for heel pain, they may see a big heel spur on the bottom of the heel bone. While it looks like it hurts, would you believe that a heel spur is not usually the cause of your heel pain?

In fact, that's the reason people don't come to get their heel pain checked when they have pain. They assume that they have a heel spur and it needs to be removed. They already decided that they need surgery and don't want it. Here's the good news, surgery is rarely needed to cure your heel pain less than 5% of the time.

So if the spur is not causing your pain, what is? It's usually plantar fasciitis. I'm sure you've heard of it. It's extraordinarily common. Plantar fasciitis and a calcaneal spur go hand in hand. If you pull back your big toe, you'll see a band of tissue become prominent on the bottom of your foot. That's the medial band of the plantar fascia and it attaches to your heel. If you have plantar fasciitis, doing this maneuver may reproduce the pain you typically feel. And that's what happens with every step you take. The thick, elastic, fibrous, plantar fascia pulls on your heel. Each time it happens, it causes microtrauma that your body tries to heal. That's what inflammation is, your body sends up a flare that something's wrong and sends resources to heal it.

The first thing you can do to reduce inflammation is to ice your heel. You can do this by applying an ice pack to your heel for 15 20 minutes. Try to ice at least twice a day. You're probably feeling the most pain when you first step out of bed at night. You can help this by stretching your foot with a towel before you get out of bed. You should also roll a tennis ball beneath your foot for 30 seconds. Doing this should improve your pain approximately 50% of the time.

Make sure you're wearing a wellfitting, supportive shoe. I like running shoes since they typically provide the most support. You should also consider an offtheshelf insole. Remember, you want insoles that support your foot so they can't be floppy. Get a good insole from a running shoe store.

You should also try a stretching splint or a night splint. If you can't wear the splint all night, then wear it for an hour before you go to bed and then 15 minutes when you wake up and before you step out of bed. Additional stretches would be helpful. In addition to stretching with a tennis ball and ice bottle, stretch your calf and hamstrings. Doing this will help approximately 75% of the time.

If you still have pain, it's time to come into the office for treatment. There we can consider treatments such as cortisone injection to drop antiinflammatory medication where the inflammation is. We can consider Shockwave therapy and noninvasive treatment to enable the body to resolve the inflammation. Custom foot orthotics are also very helpful to treat plantar fasciitis. It's nextlevel, customized support that you move from shoe to shoe. This allows you to have customized support to allow your feet to function optimally.

The remaining 5% or less of people still having pain may need surgery to address the problem. Your odds of not having surgery are very much in your favor. Let's go back to that heel spur. How do you know if the heel spur is causing your pain? The heel spur causes pain when the fat pad in your heel wears away. Unlike plantar fasciitis, where you feel pain when you first step out of bed, you typically have no pain with those first steps with the heel spur. You can expect increased pain as the day goes on and you're on your feet. Don't be discouraged, you can add artificial fat beneath your heel by using a gel heel cup. That will cushion the heel spur and resolve your pain.

#HeelSpur #PlantarFasciitis #homeremedies

00:00 Introduction
01:04 Does a Heel Spur Cause Heel Pain?
01:41 How Plantar Fasciitis causes Heel Pain
02:46 How to reduce inflammation of plantar fasciitis
03:48 What shoes and insoles to wear for plantar fasciitis
04:33 Stretches for Plantar Fasciitis
04:51 Inoffice treatment for heel pain
05:24 Surgical correction of plantar fasciitis
05:35 Heel pain from a heel spur
06:24 How to connect with Houston podiatrist Dr. Andrew Schneider