The innovation of customizing foot wear and the vision of improving foot care

Recently, the competition in the market for customized shoes has been put on the stage. Nike, Puma, and New Balance, one following another, launched the customization service and advertised certain shoe models on-line. Their target customers of these types of sports shoes are regular runners, a few professional athletes, and school kids, who have to take the physical education classes. The launch of customizable shoes delivered two main messages from the market. First, there is a great amount of consumers who are willing to spend money on the uniqueness of the product. Second, people have begun to realize that since everyone has different physical conditions, it is better to have products that are specifically tailored for the betterment of personal health.

Consider New Balance’s classic US574 runner as an example. The customization process includes detail steps of personalizing the shoes, such as selecting the colors of the lace and sole to name a few. The price of customization is $100+ and the delivery time is 4-8 days. In some cases, customers could also use CAD program or Photoshop to design their shoes on their computer. The Nike Air Max+ 2011 iD running shoes are also popular because of their broad selection of colors and the friendly prices. Also, with an iphone, one can download the necessary apps and easily customize his/her shoes.

 How to use iphone customize your shoes

 

(resource: Youtube) 

Use Photoshop design your shoes

(resource: Youtube)

With big brand names backing these products, the public demand for customized shoes has increased, but can the trend be extended to professional foot care?  

The structure of our feet is very complex and delicate.

http://www.footcaredirect.com/anatfoot.html

According to the research done by American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons (AAOS), one-third of the American population’s left foot is larger than the right foot. One-third has a larger right foot than the left and only the remaining one-third has feet that are the same size.  Many physical therapists, researchers and educators have been advocating raising public awareness of the anatomical complexity of feet. Some common sports injuries such as sprained ankles are easily avoidable by choosing a pair of suitable shoes. However, some physical anomalies in the feet require special soles to help owners balance their bodies better. Otherwise, many types of pain or diseases may occur.

Although the commercials of the famous foot wear companies could arouse public awareness of personal foot care, so far it has not introduced the concept of using right shoe soles. There are many obstacles that made these companies hesitate to combine the sole-manufacturing technology used in physical therapy, with their famous shoe models.

First of all, it is hard to train professionals to make customized shoe soles. To teach an undergraduate student of physical therapy how to craft a shoe prototype, the school has to first spend two years on his/her basic education. In other words, not until his/her third or fourth year of undergraduate study, will the crafting technique be taught in class. The labor cost of crafting shoe soles is quite expensive than crafting traditional shoe soles. 

Customized shoes soles could be very costly. (Price listed: $50+)

(https://secure.yoursole.com/us/)

Second, the sole consumption market is comparably small, and there is still a lot of room for improvement in physical therapy education and marketing. Recently, I read a blog (Note1) written by a physical therapist, wherein I learned much about the author’s observations and analysis of the competition between physicians and physical therapists that blocked the marketing process of physical therapy.

Usually, people are more accustomed to listen to their physicians’ advice and take it as the truth without giving it a second find. However, in many situations, it would be better a physical therapist. One can save time, money and energy, by not receiving drug prescriptions or intrusive treatment, but instead, merely changing a pair of shoes.

Third, it is difficult for the companies to find effective and efficient healthcare communication methods to avoid such sensitive topics as obesity, and to change consumption behaviors. For instance, it might be improper to put “a flat feet solution” in commercials.

Nonetheless, it is still pleasant to see the shoes markets begin to incorporate the commercialization of customized foot wear. It may be a good idea to merge or ally the famous shoes companies with the practice of shoe sole making in physical therapy, in the future. By doing so, the customers could not only benefit from the stylish personal design but also from healthier feet.  

(Note1):This is the link of the physical therapist's blog: http://www.sterlingospt.com/blog/

Healthcare communication and sports injuries prevention

By Malcolm T. F. Read, Paul Wade (Note1)

When we were watching the Olympic Game, the World Cup, and many other world-class sports events, we could easily learn from the news that some star athletes would bring their personal physical therapists with them to obtain the most timely and relevant advises. This is a typical case of healthcare communication particularly in physical therapy. Physical therapy is a broad study. It includes the sports medicine, early treatment, long-term care, rehabilitation, the study of occupational injury, spinal cord injury, and poor posture and aches and etc. In this article, I will talk about some health care communication media and how it works on preventing sports injuries.

Unlike the general medicine study, physical therapy is seldom discussed solely through social media such as TVs and newspapers. However, it becomes more and more important in today’s society because of the growing population that does sports.

If you are or will be doing sports, let’s do some very simple questions to see if you are doing it in the right way. First, do you wear proper sports shoes? Do you feel comfortable wearing them? Second, do you know how many times you exercise per week, and how many hours you do for each time? Third, do you know the strength of your body and what kind of sports is suitable for your current physical condition? Fourth, do you know the following figures that indicate your Health Related Physical Fitness? 1. Body Mass Index (BMI) 2. Cardiorespiratory Endurance (CR endurance) 3. Muscular Strength & Endurance  4. Flexibility.

If you find it hard to answer most of the questions, I suggest you to reach out some resources that could prevent the occurrence of sports injuries. The distribution of the health care knowledge, such as the prevention method of sports injuries, is called health care communication. Health care communication could be applied in any kinds of media tools such as TVs, radio broadcast, newspapers, magazines, and most importantly, the internet.  

The most pervasive tool we could use to search the knowledge of sports medicine is the Internet.  Here are several resources that could provide users suggestions and solutions to specific problems.

The Stop Sports Injuries website

http://www.stopsportsinjuries.org

This website categorized many types of sports injuries, such as those of baseball, basketball, cheer-leading, football, golf, and etc. You can click on quick links in each sports category and find out useful prevention tips.

(resource: www.stopsportsinjuries.org)

The Virtual Sports Injuries Clinic website

http://www.sportsinjuryclinic.net/cybertherapist/injurylist.htm

(resource: www. sportsinjuryclinic.net)

This website provides terminology explanations for post-sports injuries and treatments. For example, when talking about ankle broken, it tells you which the common ways ankle broken occurs are. It is useful for beginners to learn the physical structures for further research. The picture of the anatomy of the body or body parts could help users understand the position of the injury.






Note 1: "Sports Injuries: A Unique Guide to Self-Diagnosis and Rehabilitation" By Malcolm T. F. Read, Paul Wade - Churchill Livingstone/Elsevier (2009) - Paperback -

225 pages - ISBN 044306816X

Introduction

 Hello readers,

This is my first post and I will be writing articles to talk about healthcare communication in physiotherapy, or physical therapy, for the next eight weeks. Here is something about me and why I am interested in the topic:

I am business person but I have been interested in physical therapy since late 2008. I remember the time I had a severe pain in my waist, and had to leave the job that I loved very much. Ironically, I was told that I received a promotion almost at the same time I started to feel the ache. That was a turning point of my life. Having been told that I should not miss any treatment sessions, I went to see the physical therapist for three months in a row.

When I started to run back and forth between the office and the rehabilitation center in the hospital, I learned the importance of staying healthy. I also set up a goal to explore the healthcare industry, particularly in the area of physical therapy. In fact, the severe waist pain I got resulted from the sport injury I received when I was playing volleyball as an undergrad. The injury was not treated properly, and it became a chronic ache. My busy life in the business world worsened the condition.

I believe that lack of the knowledge and information could lead anyone to the situation I was faced with. By improving healthcare communication for physical therapy, we can definitely arouse the public's interest in taking good care of the body. For example, doing proper stretches after exercising, and periodically taking a physical examination, to name a few, are some types of information that could be more effectively distributed, to reduce easily avoidable physical conditions.