Heel pain and plantar fasciitis are common injuries in runners, athletes and in the sedentary population. There are many causes of heel pain, but in this video I am going to show you treatment method for medial or inside heel pain. Inside heel is the origin or starting point of the plantar fascia and is often painful in plantar fasciitis pain. Thickening or scar tissue can form due to repetitive irritation of the fascia and scar tissue mobilization is effective for breaking down adhesions and freeing up tissue. This is a good massage technique to treat plantar fascia and medial heel pain.

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Transcript:

Hey guys, this is Manu Kalia, physical therapist and Ayurveda herbalist. So I wanted to show you another video today. We’re going to talk about heel pain and, more specifically, medial heel pain or inside, inner side of the heel, so plantar-fasciitis-type issues. You can also have sometimes bone spurs in that area or just irritation of tissues on the inside of that heel. So, very often the inside—and this is quite common in all the runners and in other athletes too—so on the inside of that heel right in there, here’s your calcaneus, okay? Here’s the inside of the foot, the outside of the foot right there. So, very often, you’re going to have pain along this medial border right up through here. Here’s your calcaneus, your heel bone, and so right in there, this area on the medial side, it’s often very painful for people suffering from heel pain, but it’s different than the area back here, posterior part where you people get heel pain also. We’re talking about this region and also from here farther down, the plantar-fasciitis-type issues where there’s inflammation or irritation of that fascia or connective tissue and thick band which supports your arch.

So this technique is just to show you how to do that cross friction massage or scar tissue mobilization to break down any thickening or adhesions that might have formed in this area. Of course, you have to address the underlying cause of the problem also, which has more to do with strength and motor control of your foot muscles, your big toe muscles as well as having good or adequate flexibility. If the ankle joint is stiff or the big toe is very stiff, it’s going to impact what happens in the foot and further up in the chain and it’s going to affect those mechanisms and also predispose you or cause some of these problems. So, missing that ankle range of motion, don’t have that dorsiflexion, if I can’t get that down far enough I’m going to change my mechanics the way my foot hits. I might do more pronation, maybe more towards a flatfoot posture, possibly. Or, the foot might want to drift out more, which is going to cause problems, possibly loading up that inside of that heel calcaneus and inside of that foot too. So not only local problems – further up the chain too.

So for this technique, what I’m going to show is pretty simple. I’m stabilizing through here. And you can lay down, too, if you need to. So I’m going to get in here, and again, we’re doing scar tissue mobilization to break down thickened, adhesed tissue, which is due to chronic irritation, possibly inflammation – the tissue gets all thickened and it’s not moving properly and it’s adhesed or scarred down. There’s lack of circulation in that area and it’s causing pain. So we are going to do scar tissue mobilization. I put a little pressure, I find those painful spots there, apply pressure with my thumb, and I’m going to back and forth – pretty small area that I’m moving back and forth. Remember, it’s not just moving on the skin. That’s not going to do anything for us. We’ve got to put some pressure there and go back and forth.

So find sticky spots, painful sore spots, and you work along those areas. You might even sometimes find further up through here, you might find some areas. So get in there and not just there, search further down through here, other parts of the fascia, and work your way all the way through. So hang up five minutes, 10 minutes, work through those regions.

So next thing you can do is, of course, I can tack it down a little bit and do some tack and stretch. I can press, stretch the foot, tack and stretch, so free up any tissue that’s been kind of bound up through there. I can stretch, tack and stretch. So I’m going to look at different areas along the length of the fascia that might be all tightened up through there that can possibly restrict mobility also and proper mechanics. So I might put some pressure here; with my other hand, I’m going to do some track and stretch, tack and stretch, tack and stretch. Of course, this is a two- person technique, so you are going to need somebody else’s help to do that.

So I’ve shown some other soft treatment techniques or one-person techniques in the past for that area as well, so check those videos out. But this one, you do need somebody to really get in there and break that tissue down and then improve the mobility of that tissue.

So I hope you found that useful and it helps you. If you have any questions, leave a comment, and subscribe to the channel. Share the video, guys, if you think somebody else will benefit from it.  Alright guys, thank you.