Casey Bass: We all know that any building is only as good as it's foundation. Well, Doctor Marshall, believes the same thing, but about, a different type of structure, the human body.
We spent a lot of time and energy as coaches, working on every area of athletic development to make our kids better. We run drills, we lift weights, we can do sprints, run stairs. But Dr. David Marshall, friend of the show and Director of Sports Medicine at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, kind of has a different opinion about, something that might get overlooked a lot? And that has to do with our feet. What is it about, our feet that's so important?
David Marshall: Well, I think the most important thing about, the feet is that's the place where your body hits the road, that's where the rubber hits the road. So these athletes I guess, these sites and swimmers and cyclists, the feet and how the foot interacts with the ground is very important, with athletic performance and injury prevention.
Casey Bass: So what are some of the problems that we face, as far as our kids go, with their feet?
David Marshall: One of the things that I'm starting to see very common in my Sports Medicine practice is pronation. Pronation, the Latin term, is flat feet. If you look at the kid's feet from behind, you want to make sure, that they don't collapse their arches. The kids that collapse their arches or lose that arch a little bit, pronate and that can have significant, impact on increase in the development of low extremity pain syndrome or injury and also performance.
Casey Bass: Alright. So once you've figured that your kids flat foot. What can you do about it?
David Marshall: Well, you need to correct the flat footedness. In other words, if you find that your kid is an nearsighted, you get them glasses. If you find out they have flat feet, you get them some kind of orthotics and pronation it varies a different degrees. We've all seen that. You walk behind a child whether be it six flags or at school that's in bare feet or flip flops and they're actually bearing weight on their in-steps. That's really flat feet and that kid is going to be at a high risk of injuries.
Well, the kids just might pronate ever, so slightly. So that the way that you treat it depends on the degree of the pronation.
Casey Bass: How does pronation affect athlete performance?
David Marshall: Well, it can really effect in two ways. It can increase injury or increase the risk of injury. It can also decrease performance. The way, it increases injury, is pretty simple. If you think, you've taken the foot there's 26 bones that make up, the foot and the ankle and it was designed to hit the ground, roll to the neutral position and then push off.
When the kids pronate, they still hit the ground with the outside of their foot like they should and then they pronate to the neutral position during stance and that gives those 26 bones, the proper alignment to develop the most torque to push off on. So you're vertical leap and your proportion forces are going to be better as long as those feet are lined up.
In the kid that pronates, number one, they hit the ground. They roll into the neutral position, but they don't stop. They roll inward farther, and collapse those arches. When those arches collapse then, those 26 bones of the foot and the ankle tend to collapse a little bit. Think of a 26 brick wall, if there is 26 bricks in a wall and they collapse a little, it becomes a much less stable wall.
So number one, that athlete's foot is on the ground, longer than it should be which slows him down. And number two, when they decide to push off, they don't have near the stability to push off, to gain forces. So they can lose speed and they can lose performance if they pronate.
Casey Bass: And they can also get injured. Show us, some of your little toy to that you bought?
David Marshall: Well, they -- can I get the injuries? That is I can get injured and the injuries can be just as generalizes, ankle plain, shin splints which is very common in distance runners. Kids that pronate, just think about, it they put a lot more pressure on the inside of their ankles and legs. And shin splints, is due to the increased stress on the inside edge of the shinbone, even knee pain, low back pain, even hip pain can be attributed to pronation.
Think if you're car. If you have broken axle, you have one tire that's flat or both tires have decreased air pressure. I don't care, how nice of an engine you put in your car, if you don't have proper wheel alignment or air pressure, you're going to loose performance and the body is the same way.
Casey Bass: So this is just general shoe insertion?
David Marshall: Yeah, when I see kids that have pronation and we are identified and I start talking about, how to correct, that we get into orthotics. Now, orthotic is a shoe insert in an arch support, that can be used to prevent pronation. Most shoes such as this new balance, they put some type of shoe insert or an orthotic in their shoe, and new balances are removable and you look at that. But that's not really very rigid support. When a kid pronates, he or she is going to collapse that very readily.
So the thing that they put in your shoes really isn't adequate to correct the pronator. So then, you need to look into some other type of orthotic or some other extra device that you can put in and you can get them anywhere from the 1199-- at Eckerd or you can spend into the $400 to $500 to get a nice custom orthotic.
For the kids, that still have the potential to grow I find it hard to recommend spending a lot money or make an investment for something like this, if the kids might grow out of it within a year or so. To me that's not a very good investment. So I'm kind of left with the semi-custom or the off-the-shelf orthotics and there's places like Fleet Feet, for deputies Big Peach Running, Foot Solutions. There's all kinds of places out there that can give you a nice semi-custom orthotic. This is called a superfeet which I think, it goes about $59 to $60 at a good running shoe company or even sporting good stores REI, -- and even Sports Authority have orthotics very similar to this which are pretty good to get kids to a season or two depending on the size of their foot. This is another one.
This comes from a guy that I know name Jim Fox, who is a founder of Multi Sport Orthotics and he is a certified Athletic Trainer and certified Orthotist. And what he does is he takes a orthotic that's already made and then he tries to modify as best he can, to fit the needs of the foot. So it's really the true semi-custom orthotic. He doesn't build one from scratch, but he really saves a lot of cost, because he modifies on already made orthotic.
Casey Bass: So what's the difference in that and that $600 on?
David Marshall: Well, the $600, the materials just made a little storey. This is designed to last a lifetime. This will not wear out. It's going to last you many years where something like this it's more molded plastic or something like this is not -- the material is going in with aren't, newly as expensive. The polymer resins aren't designed to last forever. But they could last you a good couple of years, depending on the foot size.
Casey Bass: Once again, lot of great information, Doctor, thank you so much.
David Marshall: Thank you.
Casey Bass: If you have any questions, at all, just go up to our blog section, whatever blog happens, to be there even if it's not about orthotics, ask Doctor Marshall a question. I promise you, he never tires of talking about orthotics. I think he asks ladies at the checkout line at the grocery store if they are flat foot and tries to get them an orthotic. He is very passionate about, making sure of peoples feet or health and we'll pass in about, you.
Thank you so much for joining us. We really appreciate it and look forward to seeing you, right back here, next time for another great edition of Clubhouse GAS.
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