If your child is experiencing heel pain, then there are a few measures that you can take to try to reduce their pain. Heel pain that is persistent can have a severe impact on your child's ability to walk or run. It may also require that your child does extensive therapy or even surgery. The following are some tips that you can use to help your child prevent developing heel pain.
Keep Your Child's Weight In Check
Making sure that your child does not become obese is one of the best ways to help your child avoid chronic heel pain. Obesity puts a lot of pressure on your child's heel and may cause them to experience severe pain. If your child is overweight you should ask your doctor about the best method of weight loss for your child.
Choose The Right Shoes
Wearing comfortable shoes is an essential part of reducing or preventing heel pain. This means that you must be aware of when your child should get new shoes or when you need to adapt their current shoes to prevent heel pain. Here are some helpful guidelines for knowing when to discard or adapt your child's shoes.
- Whenever your child complains that their shoes are causing pain you should get rid of the shoes immediately. Do not assume that your child will adjust to the shoes and that the pain will go away in time, since this increases the chance that your child will have chronic heel pain.
- If your child wears flat-footed cleats for sports, then you should use shoe inserts to raise the heel.
- Replace cleats as soon as you notice any signs of wear and tear because cleats lose their effectiveness with age.
Use The RICE Strategy
The RICE strategy calls for your child to do four important things to relieve heel pain.
- R stands for rest. This means that your child is take a break from intense sporting activities, since these can strain the heel.
- I stands for ice. Ice should be applied to the foot to reduce pain.
- C stands for compression. Use ice and a rag to make a cold compress for your child's heel.
- E stands for elevate. Let your child elevate their foot to improve circulation and reduce heel pain.
If you use the strategies that have been outlined above, you should be able to prevent your child from developing chronic heel pain. If your child is at a healthy weight and has been using the RICE method but still complains of heel pain, talk with a place like Accurate Foot & Diabetic Care.
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