Buying Shoes for a Healthy Gait

A well-aligned skeletal system starts from the bottom up. Think about it: if there’s a misalignment in your foot or ankle bones, everything above them can be off-center enough to cause chronic soreness and fatigue. We perform extremity adjustments at the ACT Wellness Center in Woodbridge and provide customized foot orthotics, allowing our patients to recover from imbalances in their knees, hips, and lower backs. But since we’re in the holiday shopping season, we thought we’d share some tips for buying shoes that will provide you with better support.

One of the most common mistakes people make when buying shoes is not getting both their feet measured. Often, people’s left and right feet are slightly different sizes, so they should know from the start whether they’ll need supportive orthotics for at least one shoe. They should also wear socks of a similar thickness to the ones they expect to wear with certain shoe types, and may want to go later in the day, when their feet have spread out a bit from bearing their weight.Shoe manufacturers are making more flip-flops, sandals, and dress shoes with arch support, but buyers still need to take care that both the bottom and side of their foot will be supported. Athletic shoes should also provide cushioning and stability to the ankle. 

If used daily, athletic shoes will probably be worn out after a few months, at which point they will need to be replaced. In general, shoes need to be replaced when their treads no longer have grip or when the shape of their cuff is distorted enough to stop providing ankle support. Buyers should remember to lace the shoe the way they intend to wear it, but if a shoe is uncomfortable after being worn in the store for ten minutes, it is unlikely to get any better.

If you still have doubts about how your gait is affecting your extremities, come in for an assessment at the ACT Wellness Center at 14111 Minnieville Road, Woodbridge, Virginia. To schedule an appointment with Dr. Carmelino Caratozzolo, call 703-491-9355 or visit ACT Wellness.

 

 

Hip Labral Tears

Have you felt stiffness in your hip or heard a locking sound coming from the top of your leg when you move? If so, don’t dismiss that as a normal part of aging. You may be suffering from a treatable condition called a hip labral tear. At ACT Wellness Center in Woodbridge, we believe everyone can achieve a healthy lifestyle, and are committed to providing noninvasive solutions for pain. Our own Doctor Carmelo Caratozzolo is a certified chiropractic extremity practitioner, meaning he can assist people experiencing problems in their lower limbs.

 

The hip joint is a ball and socket, with the ball at the top of the femur fitting into a socket called the acetabulum. The acetabulum has a ring of cartilage, called a labrum, that secures and cushions the femoral head. But the labrum can be torn by an acute injury or degenerate over time, and if a person develops a bony spur over their joint, their femoral head may become impinged and not be able to move fully. Tears in the labrum may result in pain, swelling, and locking of the joint, which may be worse when a person engages in repetitive movements or subjects their hips to extended pressure.

 

Diagnosing a labral tear will require imaging and range of motion tests. Typically, labral tears are accompanied by other injuries, but they may be mild or not result in symptoms at all. Patients will need to temporarily reduce their activity and then work back to normalcy through physical therapy designed to improve their hip flexibility and strength. They may also require chiropractic extremity adjustments to their hips or joints further down their legs to correct for imbalances that may have been contributing to wear and tear, and they may benefit from low level laser therapy to improve blood flow and reduce inflammation.

 

To stop hip pain before it becomes debilitating, schedule a visit to Dr. Carmelo Caratozzolo at the ACT Wellness Center, 14111 Minnieville Road, Woodbridge, Virginia. Call 703-491-9355.

 

Fall Prevention

Many people are still spending more time at home, but that doesn’t mean they’re completely safe from injury. We provide non-invasive, non-addictive care for sprains, dislocation, and other musculoskeletal injuries at the ACT Wellness Center in Woodbridge. But we also value prevention, and since so many knee, hip, and lower back injuries result from falls at home, we wanted to share some tips for preventing them.

 

Some simple ways to prevent falls are to keep walkways clear and well-lit. It might be a good idea to put double-sided tape on the undersides of throw rugs and to install lights that are motion-activated or controlled by clapping. There should be enough space between furniture for a person to move easily and spills should be immediately removed from the floor. People should avoid walking while wearing stockings without shoes, and should ensure their house shoes provide arch support and cushion the ankle against twists.

 

Other ways of mitigating or preventing falls are to increase core strength and hip flexibility through low-impact exercise. This will make someone less likely to lose their balance and less likely to incur overuse injuries that will cause them to adjust their gait. Our Bio Nutrition service can also help patients to ensure they’re getting sufficient Vitamin D to keep their bones strong and that they’re getting the nutrition they need for healthy eyes and unblocked circulation.

 

If you’ve suffered a dislocation from falling or want to reduce your risk, schedule a visit to Dr. Carmelo Caratozzolo at the ACT Wellness Center, 14111 Minnieville Road, Woodbridge, Virginia. Call 703-491-9355.

Hip Bursitis

Last week, we discussed how pain in your legs could be related to your lower back. Another possibility is that a problem in the hip is referring pain to nearby areas. If you’ve developed bursitis in your hip, we at the ACT Wellness Center in Woodbridge can help you move comfortably again. But hip bursitis and its underlying causes can be tricky to identify, so let’s take a closer look at how bursae work.

 

Bursae are small cushions that secrete lubricant. There are many of them, including some in the front of the hips, but the ones likeliest to be responsible for hip pain are located to the sides and tops of the hips. The trochanteric bursae are positioned over the bony knobs on the outward side of the top of the thigh bones, one on each side. A connective tissue called the iliotibial band stretches over each, and a hip muscle called the gluteus medius connects nearby. Inflammation in these tissues could put pressure on the bursa.

 

Hip bursitis is usually more painful when a person has been at rest, or after a repetitive motion. One of the tests for identifying it is to ask a patient to try crossing their leg over the midline of their body, which would often be difficult. Treatments include temporarily reducing activity, extremity adjustments to correct problems in the hip or knee’s alignment, low level laser therapy to reduce inflammation, and therapeutic exercise to rebuild the hip’s strength and flexibility. We can also perform adjustments on the lower back if the patient has been walking with an uneven gait to avoid putting more pressure on one hip.

 

If you’ve suffered a hip injury or have gradually felt it become stiffer and more painful, schedule a visit to Dr. Carmelo Caratozzolo at the ACT Wellness Center, 14111 Minnieville Road, Woodbridge, Virginia. Call 703-491-9355.

Sacroiliac Joint Dysfunction

Do you feel pain or stiffness in your lower body? A joint problem might be to blame, but there are several joint dysfunctions that could cause similar symptoms. At ACT Wellness Center in Woodbridge, we provide natural, holistic pain management with special emphasis on musculoskeletal disorders. This week, we want to educate our patients about one of the lesser-known causes of lower back pain: sacroiliac joint dysfunction.

 

The sacrum is the structure of fused vertebrae that dangles beneath the lumbar region of the spine. It connects on both sides to the iliac crests, which are the highest bones of the pelvis, and the two connections are called the sacroiliac joints. These joints can suffer stress, especially when their supporting lower back and pelvis muscles are weak or tight; typically they don’t have very much mobility.  Inflammation of these joints is called sacroiliitis, and it may cause a person to feel sore in their lower back and buttock. Usually, only one side is inflamed at a time.

 

Although sacroiliac joint dysfunction is less likely than a herniated lumbar disc to compress a nerve, it could still cause pain to radiate outwards. A person is especially likely to feel pain when they put weight on the joint. We can make a diagnosis by testing how a patient responds to pressure on different bones. If a person has a sacroiliac issue, we can treat them by performing chiropractic adjustments, and by reducing their inflammation through low level laser therapy and electric muscle stimulation. Our chiropractor, Dr. Carmelo Caratozzolo, is a Chiropractic Sports Physician and Certified Chiropractic Extremity Practitioner; he may also recommend therapeutic exercises to strengthen the lower back and pelvic regions.

If you suspect you have sacroiliac joint dysfunction or a similar disorder, visit Dr. Carmelo Caratozzolo at ACT Wellness Center, 14111 Minnieville Road, Woodbridge, Virginia. Call 703-491-9355.