The foot aches

When you are on the street - on a bus, train, in a crowd - take a look at the shoes people wear, and you will see feet, clenched in tight pads, often placed at an absurd angle. In addition, women are unsteadily perched on a high thin needle, called a heel. Men, too, squeeze their feet into narrow, sharp-nosed shoes, which cause the toes to climb one on top of the other. How often, when they come to the theater, cinema or restaurant, they take off their shoes with a well-audible sigh of relief and pleasure ... Even if you wear comfortable shoes, excess weight can also cause pain in the feet.

With us, it's no wonder that many of us suffer from constant foot pain due to bursitis of the big toe, calluses, bumps, ingrown nails, flat feet and sprains. But in this section, let's look at the pain that has nothing to do with what you're putting your foot into. There are several other common causes that can lead to significant pain.

Suppose you suddenly felt a sharp throbbing pain in your big toe, at any time of the day or night, regardless of what you are doing. You did not hurt him; No one dropped anything on him or stepped on him. You take off your boot, sock and look at your finger. He was swollen, red, hot and very sensitive. You have a gout attack. The diagnosis is all the more likely, if this happened before or if you regularly take a diuretic. These drugs not only drain excess fluid and lower blood pressure, but also raise the level of uric acid in the blood. Uric acid enters the joints, most often the thumb of the foot, causing a classic attack of gout. If left untreated, the pain can be so acute that even the slightest pressure, for example a sheet pulled overnight, brings the patient to a pulp. This extreme sensitivity is the hallmark of the gouty joint. There is no other form of arthritis, no matter how painful it is, in which the affected area is so sensitive to touch.

Another scenario: if during a walk you suddenly felt a sharp pain in the heel, you have a bone spur . If you run, seriously or jogging, and feel pain in the heel - do x-rays. He will probably find out the source of your worries - a tiny bone spur. Time is often the only remedy that can heal you of pain in the heel, and while waiting for disposal, go swimming and cycling.

The foot has many joints, each of which is the target for various forms of arthritis. Rheumatoid arthritis (we usually think that it affects only the hands) can also hit the small joints of the foot, which causes severe pain both at rest and walking. This pain is chronic and, like rheumatoid arthritis elsewhere, is accompanied by swelling and deformity.

When your foot does not get enough blood because of blocked arteries , you will feel pain in the metatarsus, first when walking, and later at rest. To say, the pain is caused by a decrease in blood supply or arthritis, a thorough external examination is required. Part of it you can do yourself. If you put your hand on your foot, on your thumb, you will feel a strong good pulse. (You can look it up a little, because the exact place can change.) If there is no pulse, if the leg is cold and the small tufts of hair that normally grow on the fingers of men have disappeared, then it is very likely that your pains are the result of poor circulation. As with vascular pain in the leg, you are a candidate for this pathology, if you have high blood pressure, evidence of vascular disease is still somewhere (for example, a stroke or a heart attack in the past), diabetes or you smoke a lot. If the pain first appeared only when walking, but now occurs in rest or during sleep, then your vascular disorders have already gone far enough.

If a blood clot (embolus) abruptly clogs one of the vessels feeding the foot, it suddenly becomes very painful, cold and numb, whitens or turns blue. In this case, a blood clot or a piece of an arteriosclerotic plaque moved, tearing away, and went down the artery. Unlike the pain when walking, which you had for months and years and in which there is no urgent need to rush to the doctor, embolism is an emergency, because the affected limb is in danger.

Arteries in the foot can undergo a spasm in the cold, and then the toes on the feet will feel a throbbing pain, first turn blue, then turn white. Later, when they get warm, the renewed blood flow will restore their normal color, but the pain will become even stronger. This pathology, called Raynaud's disease , is provoked by a drop in temperature, which does not lead to changes in normal people. This is an autoimmune disease that occurs mostly in women.

The pain in your foot may be due to nerves. As above on the leg, the nerves serving the foot come out of the spine. If the vertebral disc presses on the corresponding nerve , you can feel pain all the way to the foot. One way to check the diagnosis yourself is to try to walk on your heels. If the nerve is squeezed, the muscles of your leg will not allow such an experiment.

Nerves may not work well for various diseases, including some neurological diseases, syphilis, diabetes, alcoholism and strong smoking. Such nerve damage, regardless of cause, is called neuropathy . In this case the discomfort is intermittent , the pain sharp, shooting or burning, there is no pulsating pain, as in a vascular lesion, or constant pain, as with gout, or chronic pain, as with arthritis.

Some people suffer very much from the neur , small nerve thickening in the toes. They can not be probed or seen on X-rays. The reasons for their development are unknown, and the only way to get relief is to remove them surgically. The diagnosis of a neuromus is the diagnosis of an exception - when all other possible causes disappear.

Remember three things if you have a sore foot :

• Wear comfortable shoes. If you have to sacrifice your legs for the sake of fashion, do what elegant men and women do - go to work in sports shoes and change to elegant only at work.
• Avoid foot injuries - remember, your whole body balances on them.
• If the pain of the feet is absolutely not related to injury or shoes, consult a doctor who will try to establish an accurate diagnosis.

Symptom: aching foot