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Biomechanics and Orthotics
Do you suffer from continual Back, Hip, Knee or Foot Pain?
The structure of the foot is remarkable and very intricate, 26 bone, 33 joints, 19 muscles, 107 ligaments, and a maze of nerves, all this works to keep you balanced and to support your body, whether you are standing, walking, driving a car or climbing a rock face. Each step we take we put approx 2 1/2 times our body weight though our feet, if you think how many steps we take on average each day, approx 10,000 it is not surprising that we will suffer from time to time aching sore muscles and misalignments, such as tired aching legs, ankle sprains and flat feet.
The foot is the base plate for our whole body, and sometimes symptoms and pain can often present themselves further up the body in knees, hips and back.
Biomechanics is the understanding of these relationships.
I would like you to think why you are in pain and is your pain reoccurring?
I am going to take you back in history to explain and hopefully understand the interaction between the foot and the rest of the body.
Originally we lived on soft natural surfaces like grass, earth, sand and undulating surfaces that all mould to your foot, this was our natural environment so it did not matter if we had different leg lengths, flat feet, etc. but we had four incredibly functional limbs that were roughly the same length Nature and evolution was not interested in, nor did it have any reference points for geometry.
Then came concrete with a 100% energy return, no longer did we have lovely soft surfaces, that our body could sink into but hard surfaces that returned all our problems, suddenly our evolved compensation mechanism is insufficient for the absolute geometry of a modern world most of us spend every day walking and standing on unnatural hard, flat surfaces such as pavements and floors. So the different leg length, flat feet etc. now does make a difference, and the body has to compensate in other ways such as through the knees, hips, and back.
Using all this knowledge we can alleviate pain by making adjustments to the mechanics of the foot, this is biomechanics.
Sometimes our body needs help in compensating for all this energy return, and orthotics or insoles could be the answer.
Pease contact me for more information or visit my www.bodyalignment.co.uk website which goes into body alignment in more details. |
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