Heel pain in children

Is your child experiencing pain at the back of their heel? or have you noticed after long periods of activity your child is beginning to limp or favour one leg? chances are your child is likely experiencing Calcaneal apophysitis or more commonly known as Sever’s disease.

What is Severs disease

Severs is a self-limiting condition, typically targeting children between ages of 8 and 14 and is where the achillies tendon which separates the calf muscle on the back of the leg from the heel bone is an active phase (meaning changing from cartilage to bone.) During this stage, this attachment area (apophysitis) can become painful and tender typically when growth spurts are occurring or the child is quite active due to this load and pressure placed on the apophysitis

Factors – to look out for what contribute to Sever’s

· Height/Weight – increased BMI ca increase the load on the achillies

· Age = 8 – 14 years old (pre-pubescent - puberty phase)

· Physical activity = if your child has increased the volume, intensity of frequency of activity

· External factors = changing of footwear (from shoes with lower heel heights e.g., football boots, barefoot or thongs place more load on the apophysitis due to increase stretch on the achillies tendon)

· Foot posture = if excessively flat or excessively high arched

Treatment

• Biomechanical assessment – A full biomechanical assessment from one of our expert team members here at SOLE THERAPY assessing from the hips down finding the root cause of the condition and not just treating the symptoms

• Custom foot orthosis – to provide structural and functional support to realign the posture into optimal mechanics

• Tailored exercise program – targeting certain muscles to either build or stretch the muscle to achieve the desired goal

• Heel lifts - to provide short term relief from reducing load on the posterior compartment

• Footwear advice - to help support that specific foot type depending on the current foot posture

Book an appointment with one of our podiatrists here at SOLE THERAPY today!

Words from our podiatrist,

Daniel Talevski