Foot Injury, which expert should I see??

lukich79

Hi Lads

I am 36 year old male and have been running for 4 years.
I have ran a marathon and tons of 10ks, 10 miles and halfs.

At xmas I got racing flat shoes and did a 10k trot in them, 5k of which was over a beach.
The result is that ever since I have soreness on the inside of my foot, below the ankle ball.
I have not run in these again, they are now expensive slippers

I googled it and the symptoms tell me its a problem with the posterior tibial tendon.
I ceased running for 3 weeks, joined the gym and especially strengthened my calfs and hips.
I have also got physio band and am strengthening the tendon itself. All this helped.

I have been back running now 3 or so weeks, running doesn't seem to actively cause pain in the tendon, but I feel something isn't right and in the mornings, when I get out of bed, the tendon is sore. Also my calfs now hurt when I run. I am using the foam roller to help with this.
Its a kind of a niggle-ing injury as I can still run, but one foot feels different to the other as it touches the ground.

I have decided I need some professional advice. I am living abroad, but will be home in march. I want to arrange to see someone then, but I don't know which expert I need.

Do I need a sports injury specialist?
A physio therapist?
a podiatrist?
A good barman?
Some other expert?

I am based in the north west, if anyone can recommend someone in this region that would be sweet.

Thanks in advance Lads and Lassies.

hillsiderunner

lukich79 wrote: »

I googled it and the symptoms tell me its a problem with the posterior tibial tendon. I ceased running for 3 weeks, joined the gym and especially strengthened my calfs and hips. I have also got physio band and am strengthening the tendon itself. All this helped.

I have decided I need some professional advice. I am living abroad, but will be home in march. I want to arrange to see someone then, but I don't know which expert I need.

Do I need a sports injury specialist?
A physio therapist?
a podiatrist?
A good barman?
Some other expert?

I am based in the north west, if anyone can recommend someone in this region that would be sweet.

I saw ecolii (on this forum) about my calf injury in Dublin in Dec/Jan while I was home for a trip (I am also living abroad). He is a meuromuscular sports massage therapist but has good overall physiotherapy knowledge. My injury was to the posterior tibialis but not the tendon (hurts a bit higher up than that).

As well as the massages he gave me some good stretches/ball-rolling which have helped detighten the muscle. But he's not North-West ... But I think either physio or sports massage therapist would be fine if they work with runners. The massage therapist I went to over here suggested I might try a podiatrist .. fortunately the injury *seems* to be getting banished now so I probably won't end up doing that.

I'd be a little bit wary of self-diagnosis via the internet. My physio over here hadn't told me which particular calf-muscle was being responsible, and I decided via internet that it was the soleus (the symptoms being more similar to that than the gastro). I'm not clueless, have reasonable knowledgeable about this stuff. But it was the posterior tib. in fact.