What is plantar fasciitis?

Plantar fasciitis is something we see so much of in SPARC. It is often a debilitating injury for people. It stops them doing activities that they love. It is a very common cause of inferior heel pain that can be triggered and aggravated by prolonged standing, walking, running and obesity, among other factors.

What can I do for it?

Treatments are largely noninvasive and efficacious. Our treatment protocol @SPARC combines both rehabilitation and other methods. One of the corner stones of our treatment is Shockwave therapy. This has been a huge addition to our treatment of plantar fasciitis and we often see people improve after just a couple of sessions. Other treatment options such as appropriate orthotics and night dorsiflexion splinting, can alleviate plantar fascia pain.

While evidence supports the use of all of the above, it is often an individual approach to see what works for individual patients.

While local injections of corticosteroids can help with pain relief, the effects are short-lived and must be weighed against the risk of fat pad atrophy and plantar fascia rupture.

Activity modification to decrease cyclical repetitive loading of the plantar fascia should be advised during the treatment phase regardless of the chosen treatment modality.

What does it look like?

Noticeable pain when taking your first few steps in the morning.

The pain may get better after a short period of walking, but returns when performing activities that load your plantar fascia such as prolonged weight-bearing, standing, walking or running.

The patient may also complain that heel pain worsens after repeat weight-bearing following a period of rest, such as standing after a period of sitting at a desk.

What will we do at SPARC?

 First we will assess you and diagnose your problem.

If your physiotherapist decides that it is actually the issue, you will enter our SPARC plantar fascia pathway.

This includes both rehabilitation and normally shockwave therapy. You can expect to undertake 4-7 sessions in total of shockwave to clear the issue. If we feel that you are not progressing after a couple of sessions we discontinue treatment and revert to another modality. This happens in roughly 10-15% of patients.

The aim is to get you back walking/hiking/running painfree and we will find a way to do this!!