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Shin splints are painful, cause you to lose precious training time and can also cause an athlete to suffer the indignation of casting and lost performance. Pain along the front of the lower leg is characteristic of shin splints. Have you felt the pain?
Pain from shin splints is caused by the twist of the tibia bone in the front of lower leg as the foot strikes the ground and rolls inward. If the athletes foot is stiff, has a high arch or over-pronates this raises the risk of developing a shin splint with hard training, excessive hill work or speed work.
Once your doctor has diagnosed shin splints he’ll prescribe a treatment plan to help you recover to your previous level of activity and prevent any further loss of training by preventing more shin splints. Treatment of shin splints starts with rest. This might be the hardest thing that an athlete has to do in the recovery and treatment of any injury.
It can be frustrating and aggravating to watch conditioning and performance fall behind after weeks and months of hard work. But it doesn’t have to be that way and in the rehabilitation process there are things you can do to increase the likelihood you’ll return at a level close to where you left.
Once you’ve been convinced to rest the leg, so you dont develop further injuries (stress fractures) or complications you can move on to finding why you developed the shin splints in the first place. Unless you determine the reason or cause you’ll be destined to repeat this process in a few short weeks or months from now.
The most common cause of shin splints is over use. But the underlying cause of the over use is that the tibia has been placed under abnormal stress, often from a bio-mechanically incorrect stride and foot placement.
Your physician will help with diagnosis and the start of treatment and rehabilitation from shin splints but you should include a visit to a podiatrist in your treatment plan to evaluate the mechanical placement of your foot during walking and running. This specialist can evaluate you walk and run and determine of over pronation or under pronation is causing a problem.
The issues of over or under pronation can be somewhat addressed through properly made shoes (for your particular situation) but also should be supported through the use of custom made orthotics. These orthotics are shoe inserts that take the place of the shoe insert that comes with your regular tennis shoes or running shoes. Although they can be pricey they also will decrease or eliminate the number of times you suffer from shin splints and potentially from stress fractures.
Important in the treatment of shin splints is rest and the proper shoes for your running form. A top end running store will have salespeople trained in the mechanics of running and will be able to steer you towards running shoes that will protect your legs as well as shoes can.
Ice or cold therapy is another aspect of your rehabilitation from shin splints. If you use ice directly on the skin you must keep the ice in constant motion, as with an ice cup. If the ice is left to sit on the skin you risk damage from frostbite. There are also ice packs made specifically for this process. Use ice or cold on the area for 15 minutes every hour for as many hours as you have available for the first week. This will help to decrease the inflammation and speed the healing.
In the first week of treatment you’ll also benefit from the use of anti-inflammatory medications such as ibuprofen. Follow the advice of your doctor or physical therapist to help decrease the inflammation and continue healing the tendons.
Once you are back to your physical activities (at least one week pain free) you should use good warm up and cool down practices to keep the tendons from becoming over stressed. Always warm up first, then stretch slightly. You can also stretch well during your cool down process to increase the flexibility of the lower leg and the ability of the foot to work at its best.
Runners and walkers should attempt to exercise on soft even surfaces which help to absorb some of the impact of the lower leg. Once you are pain free and beginning back to your activity level you can also incorporate some strengthening exercises to help protect the foot and lower leg.
Some strengthening exercises that are good to do with both legs include:
- While barefoot use the big toe to draw the entire alphabet in the air
- While standing in supportive shoes raise up and down on your toes
- While standing raise to your toes on just one foot and hold for ten seconds.
- Walk on your toes and then your heels
- With your shoes and socks off place a towel on the floor and gather it up in your bare toes
Of course only perform these exercises if you are completely pain free. Your physical therapist can help you develop a more individualized plan for your specific situation.
During the period of time when you aren’t running or getting back to running slowly you can incorporate running in a pool to continue to improve your lower leg strength and cardiovascular strength. You will find that with good form in the pool and a strong workout youll return to running in better shape than when you left it. The pool will keep your body cooler, allowing you to work harder and the water adds resistance that increases the workload on the heart.
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