Shoes: A treatment for osteoarthritis in the knees?
"Traditionally, footwear has been engineered to provide maximum support and comfort for the foot, with little attention paid to the biomechanical effects on the rest of the leg," said Dr. Najia Shakoor, a rheumatologist at Rush and the primary author of the study. "But the shoes we wear have a substantial impact on the load on the knee joints, particularly when we walk."barefoot is best again.....
"Our study demonstrated that flat, flexible footwear significantly reduces the load on the knee joints compared with supportive, stable shoes with less flexible soles."
Osteoarthritis is the most common form of arthritis and a significant source of disability and impaired quality of life. A higher-than-normal load on the knees during walking is a hallmark of the disease, associated with both the severity of osteoarthritis and its progression.
The loads on the knee joints differed significantly depending on the footwear. For the clogs and stability shoes, the loads on the knee joints were up to 15 percent greater than with the flat walking shoes, flip-flops or barefoot walking. Knee loading was roughly the same whether the subject wore flips-flops or walked barefoot.
4 comments:
The evidence that barefoot is better is definitely here, and rapidly becoming more exhaustive. The question is whether or not people will overcome the social pressure and choose to go barefoot whenever possible. I sure am and I hope others do, too!
As an aside, the restrictiveness of shoes and their harm on the body is obvious. Put your feet into restrictive, immobilizing shoes and your health will suffer - especially biomechanically. I'm positive that you would find similar results from other restrictive articles of clothing - perhaps like in men and women who must wear suits to work. I'm sure that has an effect on mobility, and poor mobility eventually leads to injury or worse.
I wonder would the same advice (barefoot or minimal) hold true for backpackers who carry a lot of extra weight?
Not just barefoot, John, the study showed minimal, flexible footware of benefit also ... like huaraches ... forcing the foot to to work as designed to move and stabilize, thus benefiting the whole skeletal structure.
also light wear in general can help you to avoid cardiac diseases, all kind of unnatural weight can be dangerous.
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