Tips to Eliminate Heel Pain without Surgery

“Hi, this is Dr. Silvester at the Next Step Foot and Ankle Clinic. One of the questions that we get asked, almost every day, that really concerns patients is regarding heel pain.

Heel pain is very common, it’s one of the most common things that we see in our practice. People come in and they’re very concerned about whether or not that means they’re going to have to have surgery to get rid of that heel pain. The answer that question is, “Almost never.”

Heel pain is an inflammation or a degeneration of a ligament on the bottom of your foot most of the time. That usually can be treated conservatively, using various techniques. Some of those techniques include: getting an injection, oral medications and those two by themselves are almost never effective,  but also you’ve got to incorporate some mechanical support, an over-the-counter, or even better, an orthotic device. Then also, sometimes night splints are necessary, but even with all of that, there are some patients, very few in that group, with heel pain, that subsequently don’t get better.

In that group, sometimes they have to undergo surgery, or do other things. The nice thing that we like to offer our patients here at the Next Step Foot and Ankle clinic, is sort of a midway step between open surgery that requires a long recovery and just regular conservative care, and that’s a thing that we call Cryosurgery.

It’s done with a small probe – we have a video about that on the Internet, but that provides the patient with an option that can be very effective and lets them get back up on their feet quite quickly without having a prolonged recovery.

But, the bottom line is that the vast majority of patients with heel pain can be treated successfully with conservative care and we have developed a lot of techniques to try to deal with that. So, if you have heel pain, give us a call here at the Next Step Foot and Ankle Clinic, and we can probably help you get back up on your feet very quickly. Thanks for listening!”