Stepping Out – Get your feet fit

Time to bare your sole

Time to put a spring in your step, says Jenney Klose Director of Feet First in Thame.

For months we have cocooned our feet in thick socks and sturdy boots. The dark days of winter are behind us however and it’s time to start freeing those toes up. 

If the thought of slipping your feet into sandals and flip-flops fill you with horror, fear not, Feet First are here to get your feet fit, healthy and looking great. “Our aim is simple, we want our patients to leave Feet First with happy, healthy feet,” says Jenney.

Podiatrists like Jenney understand how important it is to take care of our feet. During an average day, we take about 8,000 steps (even more during spring and summer) and depending on our weight this adds up to a cumulative weight of about 600 tons bearing down on our feet.

Strain on our feet can have knock on health issues affecting our knees, hips, back even our neck.

Over time, our feet can change shape, resulting in unsightly and painful conditions. Corns and calluses are two common examples. Happily there is a solution. Insoles (Orthoses).

This innovation from Feet First is a professional biomechanical assessment and orthoses prescribing service. Gait analysis is commonly used to help athletes run more efficiently and to identify posture-related or movement related problems in people with injuries and muscle fatigue.

Any misalignment in the structure of the feet may result in pain and can cause foot, knee, hip and lower back pain. At Feet First they provide a professional biomechanical assessment and orthoses prescribing service. They make bespoke orthoses on site using their special equipment. These are designed for your particular problem, moulded to fit your feet and finished to fit your specific footwear.

Cellulite forms when fat cells bulge out between rigid connective tissue fibres that run perpendicular to the skin surface, creating lumps and dimples. The rigid connective tissue also compromises blood circulation, so nutrients aren’t delivered to the area very well, nor are toxins removed efficiently, compounding the issue further.

Most women suffer from cellulite to some degree, in part due to the inherently weak perpendicular arrangement of the connective tissue fibres (men have a stronger diagonal criss-cross structure).

A high-carbohydrate diet can also have a hugely detrimental effect: carbohydrates digest into sugar, which has a nasty habit of sticking to proteins, including those connective tissue fibres, in a process known as glycation, making them more rigid, and the skin less elastic. Genetics vessels. Unfortunately, the absorption of vitamin B12 declines with age, due to its dependence on something called intrinsic factor, a constituent of stomach acid, the output of which decreases as we get older. Vegans are also at risk of B12 deficiency, since it is only found in animal products. Vitamin B12 injections can bring a rapid improvement in brain cognition and energy.

LOOK WELL

Once you’re living well and feeling well, you may want to build on your wellbeing by looking the best you can. When it comes to improving the appearance and tone of the skin on your body, reducing the appearance of cellulite can be tremendously beneficial also play a part, of course, as do hormonal influences, particularly oestrogen.

Avoiding sitting for too long, taking regular aerobic and resistance exercise, and dry skin brushing can all help to improve the appearance of cellulite by improving both circulation and lymphatic drainage. And a low-carbohydrate diet benefits more than just cellulite: glycation is responsible for aged skin on the face, too.

Cellulite Reduction Program

If, however, you need a more targeted approach to tackle cellulite, Springwell offer a multi-procedural treatment program:

They use pulsed ultrasound cavitation to break open the most superficial, bulging fat cells so that the contents can be released, allowing the remaining fat layer to then be uniformly smoothed by radio frequency energy which warms up the subcutaneous fat tissue and stimulates the dermis to produce more collagen. Radio frequency with vacuum is then briefly applied to suck in the skin in a roller-style fashion, improving the uniformity of the connective tissue layer. They finish each treatment session with shockwave therapy, akin to deep lymphatic tissue massage, to improve both the blood and lymph circulation, break down the rigid connective tissue and stimulate the skin to rebuild it. A course of eight treatments at weekly intervals is usually recommended.

Springwell Clinic can also provide free-of-charge nutritional advice to help you “Look Well” and “Live Well”.

You can read more articles like this one in the latest edition of Thame Out.