News

On Your Marks, Gait Set, Go!

A quick look at the foot pressure plate and what it can do for you.

Blaydon Race

It’s open season for a summer of sports, with the Rio Olympics just around the corner and sporting events happening in every town and village and city up and down the country.

Exciting times ahead.

Whether it’s the London Marathon, Blenheim Triathlon, or the Blaydon Race, competing gives you that excitement in your chest where you know that your training is done and you’re going to give it your best!

With the build up of excitement and all of the hard work being poured into training, don’t forget that your feet undergo a lot of stress and that this can sometimes lead to pain or injury. 

In this piece, we explain a little about the Foot Pressure Plate, what we can tell from looking at the pressure data and how it’s useful to our athletic friends who enjoy putting their feet through their paces.

What is a Foot Pressure Plate?

The foot pressure plate is a slick device which, when walked over is able to capture the pressure points on the feet and then display your gait line or centre of pressure. This along with other technologies such as video analysis will help your podiatrist form an overall picture of your gait, but a lot can be learned from the pressure plate alone, such as where the peak pressure points are.

The key functions of the foot pressure plate (plantar measurement device) are:-

  • To record all relevant information needed to analyse the foots behaviour
  • To capture a multitude of pressure samples from both directions and then display the average
  • To give an accurate and straightforward interpretation of the function of the foot
  • These are then presented into high quality graphics

 

The gait line, or centre of pressure and maximum pressure through the plantar is shown

Why is this useful?

David, our lead Podiatrist says:

“The foot pressure plate is an invaluable tool in the Podiatrists armory to inform clinical decision making, especially when it comes to the subtle transference of pressure through the foot in a dynamic step. Crucially, it allows the podiatrist to examine the timing of forward movement. An alteration of that timing can tell a tale of dysfunction that is not visible with the naked eye or even slow motion video gait analysis. This is especially important when you are looking at the contact time of a step to be less than a second”
This allows:
  • Quick identification of problem areas with objective pressure data
  • An instant view of left/right and medial/lateral weight distribution, where patients can also instantly see data for themselves

Try for yourself for free

The North East Foot Centre has two pressure plates – one that can be used for free in the shop and one that comes out with us to sporting events.

This summer, we will be attending a number of events, including

Northumberland Triathlon, Sunday 5th June

Woodhorn Triathlon, Sunday 17th July

Keilder Water Swim, Saturday 17th September

Keilder Reiver Triathlon, Sunday 18th September

If you would like us to bring our foot pressure plate to your event, get in touch.

We’d like to wish all competitors, be they Olympians or Village Games goers an amazing summer!

 

 

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