Jennifer Matthews: Debbie Warner spends a lot of time on her feet. When she's not on a walk, she's training for her next triathlon.
Debbie Warner: I love it. I would do it for a living if I could, but I'm not that good, so.
Jennifer Matthews: Last year, intense heel pain stopped her in her tracks.
Debbie Warner: At times, I didn't even want to go from my desk to the bathroom.
Jennifer Matthews: Some experts say up to 40 million Americans have heel pain.
Marlene Reid: The band of tissue at the bottom of the foot gets inflamed and it pulls and it gets tight and that causes pain.
Jennifer Matthews: And that pain can be debilitating.
Dr. Marlene Reid: I've had patients that have told me they crawl. It's so painful to walk that they crawl.
Jennifer Matthews: Now Dr. Reid is healing heels with radio-frequency energy.
Dr. Marlene Reid: You go through the skin without to actually opening it up, without actually doing an incision.
Jennifer Matthews: After mapping out the target points, Dr. Reid delivers the radio-frequency energy with this wand. It breaks up scar tissue and increases blood flow.
Dr. Marlene Reid: The success rate, that we found so far is much greater than open heel surgery.
Jennifer Matthews: Called the TOPAZ Procedure, it takes less than 20 minutes.
Dr. Marlene Reid: It's changed their lives. TOPAZ literally changes people's lives.
Jennifer Matthews: After five months of intense pain, Debbie had the procedure.
Debbie Warner: Yeah it was pretty amazing, that it worked pretty quickly.
Jennifer Matthews: And just seven months later, she was able to finish her second Ironman Triathlon pain-free.
Debbie Warner: I don't know what I would have done if I couldn't run again.
Jennifer Matthews: This is Jennifer Matthews reporting.
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