14
Oct

Bruised Heel Bone Treatment

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Bruised Heel Bone Treatment

Bruised Heel Bone Treatment: A bruised heel can happen due to a big fall or even a light awkward fall. Check if there is damage to the fat pad!

Heel Feels Bruised:

 

Two Major Causes:

Heel Feels Bruised
The heel will feel bruised for 1-2 weeks after a large fall. If the pain is severe after the first few days, consider going in for a heel X-ray.

1) A bruised heel is usually caused by severe trauma:

  • This is usually a fall with the front of your foot pointed up.
  • This fall can magnify your body weight by 5-6x.
  • So if you weigh 200 pounds, that’s over 1,000lbs pounds of force.
  • The only think protecting your heel bone from breaking apart is about 1 cm of fat pad!
  • Both the fat pad & the heel can become bruised.
  • A bone bruise is also possible!

  • The fat pad can even herniate out into the skin.

 

Bruised Heel Bone Treatment
Running with poorly padded shoes can definitely lead to a bruised heel pad & bone.

2)Constant repetitive pounding on your heel:

  • Even running on your heel in poor shoes can magnify your weight by 2-3x with each step.
  • That is 2-3x your weight per heel for 1,000s of steps.
  • Your fat pad can become bruised and sore just like any other part of your pody.
  • Both the fat pad & the heel can become bruised.
  • A bone bruise is also possible!
  • The fat pad can even herniate out into the skin.

 

Bruised Heel Symptoms
The initial part of the running motion puts 2-3x your body weight onto one heel. This chronic pounding can cause a bruised heel bone.

 

Bruised Heel Symptoms:

  • Sore heel.
  • Especially if you push at the center from the bottom with your thumb.
  • Possibly herniated fat pad into the other edges of skin around your heel.
  • It hurts to walk barefoot on a hard surface.
  • Redness, swelling & bruising.

 

Bruised Heel Recovery Time
Recovery time can be sped up greatly with anti-inflammation treatment & cushioning of the heel.

 

Bruised Heel Recovery Time:

  • A bruised heel will usually take 1-3 weeks to recover.
  • This can be increased with shock absorption
  • If the bone is bruised as well it can take 2-6 weeks to feel better.
  • If there is still severe pain after a few days or a week, consider a stress fracture or calcaneus fracture.
  • It is possible to increased the bruised heel recovery time with PRICE therapy (mentioned below).

 

How To Heal A Bruised Heel:

The goals of bruised heel treatment are:

  • To protect the injury from getting worse.
  • To decrease the inflammation.
  • To allow healing to start earlier.
  • To make sure nothing worse is wrong!

 

Bruised Heel Bone Treatment:

How To Heal A Bruised Heel
Trying swimming or cycling for a few days to heal your bruised heel bone.

1)Offload the heel:

  • Resting does not always mean relaxing on the coach.
  • But maybe try swimming or biking instead of running for a couple days.
  • The bruise gets better in a hurry if you give it time to heal!

 

2)Ice & elevate the heel.

Heel Feels Bruised
Ice & elevate your heal to speed up the healing time!
  • Icing is key to faster healing!
  • 2-3x per day for about 15-20 minutes will decrease the flow of inflammatory cells into the muscle.
  • Afterwards the arteries will vasodilate further flushing out inflammatory cells from the region.
  • Ice has deeper penetrating power than heat.
  • Do not use heat immediately after the injury!

 

3)Topical anti-inflammation creams:

How To Heal A Bruised Heel
Topical gels & creams can help drastically.
  • There are anti-inflammatory creams that can be prescribed by your podiatrist that can decrease the inflammation and speed up your healing time.
  • Capsaicin & Voltaren gel works great.
  • Biofreeze or anything with menthol in it.

 

4)Oral anti-inflammation:

  • These include Ibuprofen & Aspirin.
  • This can be over the counter or prescription.
  • Do not take these unless instructed to do so by your physician or podiatrist.
  • Take a 1-2 week course to attempt to decrease the inflammation and speed up your healing time.
  • Take 2-3x doses per day as instructed, this builds up anti-inflammatory enzyme levels in your system.
  • Taking just 1-2 pills and then stopping does nothing for inflammation!

 

Bruised Heel Recovery Time
Get a good cushioned running shoe to protect your bruised heel.

5)Get new shoes:

  • Shoes have a max life of 300 of so miles.
  • There are built more flexible & lighter than ever.
  • This means they need to be replaced more often than ever.
  • Great business model, but get some new shoes with cushioning!

 

 

Other Causes of Bruised Heel Pain:

These are the most common other types of bottom of the heel pain.

1) Bottom Of The Heel Pain:

Bottom Of the Foot Pain
Bottom of the foot pain at the heel is most commonly by plantar fasciitis & heel spurs. You can also get a stress fracture, fat pad withering, bruising and more!

Plantar Fasciitis:

  • This is the most common source of heel and arch pain.
  • It is worse in the morning & better with massage.
  • This Includes heel spur treatment.

Foot Fat Pad Atrophy:

  • If it feels like you do not have any fat pad cushion in your heel.

Heel Stress Fracture:

  • This gradually onsets in high activity people starting a new activity.
  • It presents over days and weeks as an aching deep heel pain.

Posterior Tibial Nerve Entrapment:

  • The posterior tibial nerve runs along the back and inside of the ankle.
  • You will feel numbness, burning and tingling.
bottom of the foot pain
Bottom of the foot pain radiating along the inside back of the ankle can be tarsal tunnel. Consider this is you have numbness, burning and tingling.

Bruised Heel:

  • This happens after long running or a big fall.

Stone Bruise:

  • This is a deep contusion after stepping on a stone.

 

 

2) Bottom Of The Foot Arch Pain:

Bottom Of the Foot Arch Pain
Bottom of the foot arch pain is also mostly plantar fasciitis. You can also get bumps as a fibroma, sprain the arch and more!

Plantar Fasciitis:

  • This is the most common source of heel and arch pain.
  • It is worse in the morning & better with massage.

Plantar Fibroma:

  • This is a bump anywhere along your arch. It could be one or multiple.
  • This feels like a pebble under your skin.
Bottom Of the Foot Pain
Bottom of the foot pain due to a lump is most likely a plantar fibroma.

Sprained Foot Arch:

  • This can happen when you fall violently.
  • There may be swelling and bruising in the midfoot.

Posterior Tibial Nerve Entrapment:

  • The posterior tibial nerve runs along the back and inside of the ankle.
  • You will feel numbness, burning and tingling.

Plantar Fascia Strain:

  • If you have severe pain in your arch after a fall or injury.
Bottom Of the Foot Pain strained fascia
Bottom of the foot pain due to a strained fascia. This occurs mostly during a violent fall.

Foot Cramps At Night:

  •  Foot cramps are the most common muscle spasm in our body.

 

 

 

Ball Of The Foot Pain:

Bottom of the ball of the foot pain
Bottom of the ball of the foot pain has many, many causes.
Jump to our ball of the foot pain guide!

Foot Fat Pad Atrophy:

  • If it feels like you do not have any fat pad cushion in the ball of your foot.

Sprained Ball Of Foot:

  • This can happen when you fall violently.
  • There may be swelling and bruising big toe joint.

Foot Cramps At Night:

  •  Foot cramps are the most common muscle spasm in our body.

Stone Bruise:

  • This is a deep contusion after stepping on a stone.

Many More:

 

About the author

The Modern Podiatrist (Foot and Ankle Specialist Doctor):Today's podiatrist is required to undergo rigorous medical training that licenses them as physicians with equivalent legal standing to the MD and DO degree (These are physician recognized licenses most common only in the USA). Although admittedly the training does differ between the three degrees. The differences are listed below.In Michigan Podiatrists are trained and authorized to perform surgery in the foot and ankle up to the tibial tubercle below the knee.All our podiatrists and foot doctors have undergone rigorous training including a 4 undergraduate college degree, writing the medical school entrance exam (MCAT), followed by a 4 year medical school degree (DPM - Doctor of Podiatric Medicine),Once podiatrists in the USA complete the rigorous 4 year medical school courses, they are required to complete a minimum of 3 years of a surgical and non-surgical residency program. Some podiatrists and foot doctors then choose to go on to further fellowship training specializing in various forms of specialty such as diabetic surgery or reconstructive foot and ankle surgery.The training is not over yet! Each podiatrist must be judged by a governing body where they submit their surgical cases and are reviewed regularly to ensure excellent results. This is a career long evaluation with board qualifications and certifications every few years.So have faith that today's podiatrist is your best choice for your foot and ankle problems! We are able to approach you foot and ankle problems from a non-surgery perspective, but that when necessary we can provide you with the treatment that you need!All articles written by this account are considered to be for educational purposes only. It is impossible for us to truly assess your condition and the advice we give here is meant to give you a basis to then follow up with your podiatrist and foot doctor later.If you have any questions at all, or there is anything that we can help you with, please feel free to contact our office or email us. Podiatrists provide medically necessary treatment which should be covered by valid insurance plans, we are not a cosmetic or elective medical specialty.