You've been told you have a stress fracture in your foot! You might be feeling a little overwhelmed and worried. The first thing to know is this will heal! Our body is pretty amazing and has these unique cells that help build and heal bone tissue.
What exactly is this stress fracture? You don't recall injuring yourself in any particular way. That's because a stress fracture isn't caused be significant trauma. Rather by repetitive forces, often from over use. Such as with running or jumping. These are micro fractures that if left untreated can cause a bigger displaced fracture.
There are four different grades of stress fractures. Imaging is required to confirm a suspected stress fracture and to grade it.
It's important to SLOWLY increase your training volume, which is why following training guides is so helpful. Increasing your load by no more than 10% each week to limit stress.
Additionally, making sure your diet is meeting your energy expenditure needs in addition to nutrient density. If you aren't sure how your diet stacks up against your workouts, reach out to a nutritionist to make sure you are adequately taking care of your nutritional needs.
Make sure you are also checking the wear on your exercise shoes and replacing them as they start to break down, or ideally just before. Shoes are incredibly important to building a strong and stable foundation during exercise. Don't skimp on your footwear.
You'll need to offload that leg which means non weight bearing. You might be using a boot and/or crutches depending on where the stress fracture is located. This allows healing to take place. During this time your physical therapist can promote a decrease in pain and increase soft tissue extensibility through manual therapy. Strengthening is typically permitted as long as you're not standing on that lower extremity.
Return to sport is going to look different for everyone because of fracture location and grade. Your orthopedist will have guidelines to progressively increase your loading and activity.
If you have a foot stress fracture, reach out to our office today!