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Your mother was wrong. You didn't get bunions from torturing your feet in high-fashion shoes. If pointed-toe, spike-heeled shoes created your bunions, where did your 12-year-old daughter get hers? Why does your mother have them? And where did Grandma get her bunions? From Great Grandma. The bone structure of your feet is inherited - and so are bunions - misalignments or bony enlargements in the big toe's outer joint. If your genes predestine you to bunions, nothing can prevent them, but you can minimize their severity. Bunions have four stages: Take Care Of Yourself The big toe joint becomes dislocated, causing hammer toes and pain in toes and on the top and ball of the foot. A patient also may suffer knee, hip and back pain, because she shifts her weight to take pressure off the bunion. Although friction from a shoe rubbing skin can cause pain, swelling, fluid buildup and calluses, a bunion isn't a big callous or thickened skin. Sometimes a patient tries to cut a bunion, not realizing the bump on her toe is bone. This is very dangerous, especially for older patients with poor circulation, who can develop severe infection from the cut. A shoe pressing on the wound can cause inflammation and even open sores that are similar to "bedsores". Bunions, which usually occur in women, are caused by many factors besides genetics, including gout, rheumatoid arthritis and injury, such as jamming the toe or dropping something on it. A large percentage of bunions are painless and I advise my patients to leave them alone. Bunions should be surgically removed only when the patient can no longer find shoes to fit her feet. Sometimes it helps to pad the inside of shoes around the bunion or your podiatrist may prescribe shoe inserts called orthotics. Custom-made shoes can help, too. Here's the advice I give my patients: Stop pretending that your feet are the size of little dogs when they are really the size of big dogs. Measure your feet always!!!!
Stop squeezing your square-shaped feet into triangular-shaped shoes. Wear only rounded-toe shoes. Spike heels make your legs look great, but they are murder on your feet. Buy shoes that are made of natural materials like leather or canvas, so your feet can breathe and look for shock-absorbing innersoles. When you put your shoes away, keep them on shoe stretchers. When bunions do need surgery, a podiatrist can remove just the degenerated and overgrown bone and calcium build-up or a portion of the joint. Sometimes the entire dislocated bone is replaced with an artificial toe joint. All of the surgical procedures for bunions can be done on an out-patient basis or in the office under local anesthetic. The patient can usually return to work almost immediately, if she wears a special sandal for a few weeks. The writer is a surgeon-podiatrist who practices in Woodbury, NJ. This is a reprint from the Pulse Section of the
Courier Post.
Severe Bunion Before &
After
The patient had the procedure done without any sutures,
pins, or casts. This was done with the use of an x-ray camera. The
patient had this surgery done over five years ago. Home | About the Doctor
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