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What if flat feet were… normal? We debunk the myth about injuries

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For many a long time, if not centuries, researchers, doctors, and the general public have believed that folks with flat feet are more prone to various problems.

In particular, flat feet were thought to predispose to future pain and other musculoskeletal (i.e. muscles, tendons and/or ligaments) problems.

It was believed that flat feet were a sort of time bomb.

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However, in A latest editorial published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, my research team debunks this myth. We show that the theory that flat feet inevitably result in pain or other musculoskeletal problems is unfounded.

As a researcher in podiatric medicine at the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (UQTR), I’ll explain here the primary findings of our study.

Where does this theory come from?

The concept that flat feet are an issue goes back centuries.

It was revived in the second half of the twentieth century by American podiatrists Merton L. Root, William P. Orien and John H. Weedwho popularized the concept of “ideal” or “normal” feet.

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These clinician-researchers were the first to propose that if feet didn’t meet certain criteria for normality (e.g., well-defined plantar arch, straight heel consistent with the tibia), they were abnormal, less efficient, and more prone to injury. injury on account of multiple biomechanical compensations, akin to greater flattening of the arch during walking.

This theory has grow to be a central element of health care skilled educational programs. Although today the theory is regularly disappearing as modern curricula are updated, the theory was taught around the world for nearly five a long time, although the scientific basis was weak. In fact, science has never confirmed this theory: it remained at the stage of hypothesis.

Nevertheless, over the years and as much as the present, many health care professionals have continued to support the theory that flat feet represent a significant risk for developing musculoskeletal diseases.

As a result, the idea continues to be firmly entrenched in the beliefs of the general public.

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Do flat feet cause musculoskeletal injuries?

Contrary to theory Root et alMeta-analyses, which represent the highest level of scientific evidence, have found no increased risk of developing the overwhelming majority of musculoskeletal injuries in individuals with flat feet.

These meta-analyses identified only weak associations between flat feet and the risk of medial tibial stress syndrome (pain in the shin bone), patellofemoral syndrome (pain around the kneecap), and nonspecific lower limb overuse injuries.

That’s it.

Moreover, a systematic review ia meta-analysis showed that runners with flat feet aren’t any more susceptible to injury than runners with normal feet.

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These analyzes call into query the idea that folks with flat feet are at significant risk of developing musculoskeletal diseases.

However, despite these findings, various sources akin to gray literatureskilled web sites, forums and other media often suggest that folks with flat feet are at higher risk of injury and even require treatment – even if they haven’t any symptoms.

Unfortunately, this often leads to the need for unnecessary interventions, akin to the use of orthopedic shoes or custom-made foot orthoses for asymptomatic flat feet. This also results in significant concerns amongst patients about the appearance of their feet.

Runners with flat feet aren’t any more in danger for injury than runners with regular feet.
(Shutterstock)

Equalizing the record

Asymptomatic flat feet generally don’t require intervention from medical personnel. Based on current scientific knowledge, assessing whether an individual has flat feet to find out risk of injury is ineffective and counterproductive.

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Although an individual with flat feet may experience a musculoskeletal injury, this doesn’t necessarily mean that the flat feet caused the injury.

It is sort of possible for 2 variables to occur concurrently with no causal relationship. There is a crucial difference between causation and correlation. A cause-and-effect relationship assumes that a change in a single variable (cause) results in a change in one other variable (effect). When two variables are correlated, changes in a single variable could also be related to changes in the other, but this doesn’t mean that one causes the other.

To illustrate this idea, let’s take the following example: We give 500 children between the ages of six and 12 the same math test. When conducting correlation tests, we notice an inclination: the larger the kid’s feet, the higher the final exam grade.

This begs the query, does foot size actually affect math skills? Of course not!

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Another variable that just isn’t taken under consideration plays a crucial role on this correlation, namely age. Since feet get larger with age, there may be a robust, yet spurious, correlation!

The same rule applies to flat feet. If an individual with flat feet develops a musculoskeletal injury, current research indicates that flat feet will not be necessarily the cause and that other aspects ought to be investigated.

The relationship is correlation, not cause and effect.

Reducing overdiagnosis in health care

Reducing overdiagnosis in healthcare has grow to be crucial. This phenomenon, defined as the diagnosis of a medical condition that has no net individual profit, represents a world burden and could have adversarial effects on patient health. Physical, psychological and financial well-being.

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From a financial standpoint, it is easy to grasp that prescribing custom-made foot orthotics costing a whole lot of dollars to stop musculoskeletal injuries related to asymptomatic flat feet has a big negative impact. This is particularly true considering that the presence of flat feet only barely increases the risk of those injuries.

To address this issue, health care providers must help reduce the overdiagnosis of flat feet by more clearly distinguishing for patients between harmless anatomical variants and conditions which may be of concern.

Since overdiagnosis often results in overtreatment, avoiding unnecessary procedures will help alleviate patients’ concerns about flat feet.

Finally, we want to desert the outdated, still common belief that flat feet are an issue that puts people at high risk of musculoskeletal injuries. It’s time to alter your perspective and approach to the importance of flat feet and recognize their natural diversity in the context of overall foot health.

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First of all, it is time to think about asymptomatic flat feet for what they’re… just an anatomical variant!

This article was originally published on : theconversation.com
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Health and Wellness

What are the key risk factors for the development of degenerative knee joints? We analyzed the evidence

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Bone and joint inflammation is the most typical articular diseaseaffects Over 3 million Australians and it’s over 500 million people around the world.

. knee It is the mostly affected joint, but osteoque and arthritis may also affect other joints, including hips and hands. The condition causes painful and rigid joints.

For someone with degenerative knee disease, easy classes that many individuals take for granted, equivalent to walking, walking on the stairs or crouching, could be very difficult.

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Currently, there isn’t any cure for bone and joint inflammation. The most available treatments, equivalent to exerciseWalking AIDS and Ledines (including Paracetamol AND Non -steroidal anti -inflammatory drugs), Focus on managing symptoms. But it’s important to contemplate first of all how we are able to prevent bone and knee inflammation.

With this in mind, we now have conducted a scientific review to summarize the risk factors for the development of knee and knee inflammation. Our findings, published today in the journal Bone and cartilage inflammationIt will help us higher understand how you can reduce the risk of this state.

What we found

We collected data from the research, which over time occurred for people to envision which risk factors were related to developing knee inflammation. We included a complete of 131 studies, with the participation of over 5 million people.

We have identified over 150 factors that affected the risk of developing osteoarthritis and knee joints.

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Some key factors that increased the risk of developing degenerative knee arthritis, included obese or obesity, knee injuries and skilled physical activity, equivalent to lifting heavy objects and shift work.

We also found several other possible risk factors, including:

  • Eating large amounts of ultra-processed food (including “junk dishes”, sweet drinks and processed meats)

  • Poor sleep quality (for example, sleeping lower than six hours a day or having 1-2 restless nights per week)

  • I feel depressed.

Being obese or obesity and knee injury in the past constituted 14% of the general risk of developing osteoarthritis of knee joints.

In other words, if we were capable of completely remove these two risk factors, we could potentially reduce the incidence of osteoarthritis in the population by 14%.

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Women had almost twice the risk of developing osteoarthritis, and the older age was barely related to developing knee bone inflammation.

Knee and knee inflammation affects tens of millions of people around the world.
Tofiqu Barbhuiya/Pexels

Protective factors

On the other hand, we now have found that some factors may reduce the risk of developing osteoarthritis and knee. They included after Mediterranean weight loss plan (which incorporates so much of vegetables, olive oil, nuts, fruits and healthy fats present in fish) and after a weight loss plan in fiber.

Avoiding things that increase the risk of developing osteoarthritis, equivalent to a weight loss plan wealthy in ultra-processed food, knee damage, weight gain and weightlifting, may also help an individual reduce the risk of developing condition.

Exercise is effective treatment for osteoarthritis. It can reduce pain and improve the function.

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Our study didn’t have enough information to find out what types of physical activity (for example, walking, running, swimming) and the way much time spent on these activities can reduce the risk of developing osteoarthritis of the knee joint, so that is a very important area for future research.

How can we explain these links?

The research we included didn’t generally examine possible mechanisms combining key risk factors with the development of degenerative knee joints.

However, other studies can ensure helpful insights. A knee injury can result in knee instability and extra knee consumption that may result in osteoarthritis and knee. Similarly, Professional physical activity Such as kneeling, squatting, climbing or severe lifting can increase the risk of consumption on the knee.

A poor dream was related weight gain AND depression.

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. Duration and sleep quality It was found that it affects how much we eat and hormones responsible for regulating metabolism. Depression was related to reduced physical activity which might result in weight gain. Wearing a further weight can Increase the knee load and contribute to osteoarthritis.

Shift works can result in Bad dietary decisions AND lack of sleepwhich, in turn, can increase the risk of knee and knee inflammation.

It seems, due to this fact, that although the risk factors we discover can contribute individually to the development of degenerative knee disease, they may also affect together to extend risk.

It will not be clear why women are more exposed to the development of knee joints. However, this might be on account of the combination of factors, on this lifestyle, biological and hormonal factors.

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The Mediterranean weight loss plan is high in polyphenols, which perhaps reduce body inflammation and cartilage destruction. In this fashion, it may well reduce the risk of developing bone and knee inflammation.

A middle -aged couple runs in the park.
Lifestyle changes can reduce the risk of knee -length degenerative disease.
Peopleimages.com – Yuri A/Shutterstock

Most risk factors are modified

There were some restrictions with the available evidence. Most studies were based on populations from the United States or didn’t report on ethnic origin. We do not know much about the risk of developing osteoarthritis in some groups, equivalent to people from Latin, African and south -eastern environments. We need more research examining risk factors in other countries and populations.

Nevertheless, such a review allows us to raised understand what you’ll be able to do to scale back the risk of developing osteoarthritis.

We have found that almost all risk factors related to the developing osteoarthritis are modified, which suggests that they could be modified or higher managed with a healthy weight loss plan and lifestyle. Healthy eating, maintaining healthy weight and taking proactive steps to forestall injuries in the workplace and sports communities can potentially reduce the risk of developing this state.

Public health strategies aimed toward encouraging healthy eating and weight reduction (for example, subsidized nutrition programs and academic programs from an early age to advertise the optimal weight loss plan and physical activity) may reduce the burden on degenerative disease of the knee joints, and now have broader health advantages.

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Programs equivalent to these, in addition to reducing heavy lifting in the workplace, ought to be the subject of government strategies to unravel the burden of this painful state around the world.

This article was originally published on : theconversation.com
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Health and Wellness

Is the world’s condition fearful? Try your breath

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Is the world's condition worried? Try your breath

Ghettos

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If you’re much like me, you can now feel hopeless and overwhelmed by the state of the world. From the seemingly falling government to the growing maintenance costs and the ongoing recession, it is totally comprehensible that you’re feeling restless and stressed. However, I used to be actively searching for ways to limit anxiety and discover a sense of peace. So once I received the opportunity to take part in the respiratory session with Crea JacksonA licensed breath factor from Los Angeles, I immediately jumped on him.

But first let’s examine what breath is. Breathing is essentially a set of respiratory techniques available, which help us connect again and remain grounded after an exhausting day, week, month or yr. Breathing techniques have been designed to assist us give attention to breath, which is meant for therapeutic and meditation purposes.

Here are a few of the advantages of respiratory practices:

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  • Deepening mental brightness and focus
  • Loosening
  • Regulation of the nervous system
  • Reduction of stress and anxiety
  • Promoting leisure and sleep
  • Increasing mood and comprehensive well -being

Last week, Jackson got here to my house to conduct a 30-minute, improved and conducted respiratory session through my pool. At the starting I hesitated because I wasn’t sure if my breath could help my anxiety, but I used to be pleasantly surprised. But before we began the session, I learned a little bit more about Jackson and the way she became a breath facilitator. Her practice began due to the pandemic. “I really started my breath during a pandemic. At first I worked in entertainment, mainly behind the scenes, in production and development. I began to see the need to concentrate, and tried to find out how to do it for myself and how I can provide services to others,”.

Jackson continued: “In 2020 I slowed down, so I had a lot of time to find out how to serve others and for me. At that time I took my first breathing session, and for me it was extremely transforming, so I started my training process to be facilitated by breath.”

Jackson defines breath as principally yoga, because for her yoga is a movement and breath. “I think that people can be a bit confused when we say that breath is also yoga, because it is not completely movement, but I define breath as active. Breathing techniques can be used to help you core, grounding and free yourself from those uncomfortable emotions that we get, such as fear and depression,” he states.

I truthfully spoke to Jackson about my experiences with trauma and stress, due to regret and the way I find these emotions, often sitting in my body. For some reason, I also noticed that for some reason I don’t take enough deep breaths. So I wondered because we meet various kinds of stressors during the day and in our lives, we’re used over time.

Jackson thinks that breath allows us to return to one another. “I feel that a deliberate breath helps us explain that Gook, which we’re developing inside days, during weeks, and, as you said, the trauma we had for years. There is a breath to make it easier to explain and cleanse you, get out of the body in such a way so that you may make room for things that we’ve got to do, like offers that we wish to offer the world, and the way we are able to benefit from it so that you may happen.

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I particularly prefer it and I value breath, it’s that the practice itself is sort of low and there is no such thing as a additional pressure to enhance it in any way, like my previous experience with meditation. Jackson agrees with my cancer, but notes that breath is a type of meditation, only brighter. “I feel that breath goes hand in hand with meditation, but meditation might be harder to do, because you’ve gotten to search out your center and remain still, unlike respiratory. You still do something in breath, even when it is solely respiratory. There are different techniques during which it’s good to take into consideration the way you breathe, what I feel, I can give attention to something else.

For Jackson, respiratory is healing work, and she or he encouraged me to give it some thought in this manner during our demonstration.

Here’s how our respiratory session went. We also mentioned the following exercises. If you have an interest, we’ve got even joined the adapted list of playback!

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1. Technology: We began by getting up and performing a breath of energy release, designed to free energy and assist in staying at the moment.

Second technique: We sat down and made a couple of rounds of respiratory to assist clean our aura, a method called aura clearing breath.

Third technique: We went to the designed technique to support us in activating the spine and opening our heart energy, called the breath of the heart expansion.

Fourth technique: The fourth breath that we made together was a version of the technique called alternative breath of the nostril, designed to assist balance the two hemispheres of our brain.

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It is value noting that in this method I saw the following colours and I feel it is an indication of a spiritual relationship.

Round 1: Orange, light yellow, emerald green, light aqua blue

Round 2: Light pink and light-weight green

Round 3: Purple/Indigo

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5. Technical: Then we practiced the strategy of air designed to support physical strength, mental clarity and emotional release.

6. Technique: The last, lively respiratory technique that we did was support us in balancing and anchored our Chi, vital life force, which was called the Chief respiratory technique

7. Technical: We closed with a scan of a body during which we deliberately breathed once we scanned through our body, releasing tension and showing gratitude.

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This article was originally published on : www.essence.com
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Health and Wellness

The black community gathered to share the Wrabians. Then admin Trump stopped the study

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Some Denver parents received SMS during the brutal flu season with movies sharing why people of their districts select flu for his or her children, an unusual study on trust and vaccines in a historically black community.

But nobody will know the way it went: Trump’s administration canceled the project before the data may very well be analyzed – and scientists should not the only ones nervous.

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“For someone like me, from a black community whose income is lower, we often have no voice,” said Denver Mom Chantyl Busby, one in all the community advisers. “Taking this project from this project sends a terrible, terrible message. It’s almost as if telling us again that our opinions don’t matter.”

How to speak about vaccines with parents – or anyone – accepts a brand new urgency: no less than 216 American children have died this season, the worst pediatric roadside for 15 years, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Unvaccinated children have been driving one in all the biggest explosions of the Odra in the country for a long time, and one other disease that stops vaccine-peaks is growing.

At the same time, health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The vaccine questions have long been proven that they’re secure and effective. Trump administration movements make Covid-19 vaccines increasingly more uncertain this fall. And the administration reduced public health funds and medical examinations, including detention of vaccine fluctuations.

“We must understand what creates this challenge for vaccines and why,” said Michael Osterholm, who’s managed by the Center for Research and Policy of Infectious Diseases of the University of Minnesota and is afraid that the country is entering “Dark Dark”.

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At Denver Health, Dr. Joshua Williams is a pediatrician who talks to vaccines with confused or apprehensive parents every single day. Some even ask in the event that they can be thrown out of his practice for refusing vaccination.

No, says Williams: Building Trust takes time.

“The most satisfying meetings related to the vaccines I have, are those in families that for a long time had serious fears, trusted me for years when I looked after broken arms and ear infections-I finally vaccinated their child,” he said.

Black child, doctor, vaccines, thegrio.com
Dr. Joshua Williams, a pediatrician, whose federal funds for the vaccine awareness program, talks with a 12-year-old patient Tiovian Darden in Denver on Tuesday, March 18, 2025 (AP Photo/Thomas Peipert)

But at the age of Tiktok Williams, he wondered if digital history – seeing and hearing, which led other families to select vaccinations – might help these decisions. He selected flu vaccines as a test case – almost half of us children got one this season. And black children belong to people most prone to serious patients due to flu.

Thanks to the subsidy from the National Institutes of Health, Williams has established cooperation with Non -Profit Center for African American Health in Denver to organize workshops that mix volunteers so as to discuss how flu and flu vaccine influenced their lives. Specialists helped those that wanted to go to an extra step, transforming them into 2-3-minute polished movies.

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After two years of community involvement, five of those movies were a part of the pilot study of sending text messages to 200 families who receive care in two health clinics at Denver.

In one film, the mother described the first vaccination against flu and her young daughter, making her own health decisions after leaving the controlling relationships.

In one other grandmother, she explained how never never miss the visiting vaccine after her grandson spent his fourth birthday hospitalized with flu.

Odra exploded in Texas after staging the vaccine financing. New cuts thus threaten in the USA

Seeing “people they look, they sound, who have the experiences they have gone through, they can go through:” Hey, I felt such as you felt, but it surely modified my life, “is powerful, said Busby, who determined the vaccination of the flu of her children after hearing Williams during many family controls.

Sudden cancellation of the study signifies that Williams cannot assess whether the text movies have influenced decisions regarding family vaccines data from over two years of labor and already found Nih dollars. He also threatens the careers of scientists. Considering the next steps, Williams asked community members to use some movies in his own practice, discussing vaccination.

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Williams can also be personal, telling his families that his children are vaccinated and like his 95-year-old grandmother mentions terror polio during his own childhood before developing these vaccinations.

“We have lost a collective memory of what it is like to have these diseases in our community,” said Williams, sadly noticing the ongoing epidemic of the Oder. “I think that it will accept a common voice of the community, saying that it is important to remind people of governments that we must assign resources to prevent infection and testing vaccine fluctuations.”

(Tagstranslate) @AP

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This article was originally published on : thegrio.com
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