Pain Under The Ball Of The Foot

Hi Lisa! This is great what you are doing! My students all at one time or another have and are currently suffering from pain under the ball of their foot. The physio's have said just to rest but of course they can't with exams etc. what is this and how can we treat it and them prevent this? Thanks for all the great work you are doing Lisa. Tina. Hi Tina! Many students have issues underneath the ball of the foot and there are few reasons for this... 1)    Sesamoiditis - If the pain is underneath the big toe, this may be irritation of the tissues around the sesamoid bones. These are two little bones under the base of the first metatarsal that provide a tunnel for the FHL tendon to pass through, but they often get irritated with loaded work on demi pointe. If it is this, they will be tender to touch right over the area and especially if they roll in on demi pointe. Along with icing and careful use of anti inflammatories, padding in a doughnut shape over the area can help get them through the show, until they have time to deal with the true cause. Often the deeper cause of irritation in this area is actually stiffness in the joint at the top of the first metatarsal – where it joins the medial cuneiform bone, resulting in increased load on the head of the first metatarsal with walking and dancing. Often mobilisation of this area results in less load on the sesamiods especially with normal walking. I will discuss some more causes of Sesamoiditis in the Webinar! 2)    If the pain is more under the ball of the second toe – this may be if the second toe is longer. In this case I often create a custom made (from regular strapping tape) toe thong with supports to offload the tip of the second metatarsal. This is a GREAT tip and will also help the student balance more on demi pointe. I will make a video of this in the next few days... 3)    If the pain is more tenderness over the whole area – it may be that they are landing too heavily on the ball of the foot, and not using the Soleus muscle effectively to control the landing... Keep an eye out over the next few days as to how to get access to a 10 min video that explains everything about this! There are of course many other things that can cause pain here... but that should help weed out a few! Hope that helps! Xx Lisa < Prev   Next >