Total Pageviews

Translate

Followers

Sunday, June 2, 2013

Inverted Orthotic Technique: Current Research Project

I will be working on a research project that involves the Inverted Orthotic Technique. It is of course my privilege and honor to study this orthotic modification I invented 32 years ago. I use it daily in my practice, but have never had the finances to teach more than a handful of orthotic laboratories or keep them up with all the changes to prescription writing that has occurred in the last 25 years. 

What is the Inverted Orthotic Technique? It is a wonderful way to control pronation of the foot when the amount of pronation is considered either abnormally too much, abnormally too fast, or the pronation just places the foot in an abnormal position. Following a brief introduction of the technique in Australia, 17% of all of the orthotic devices prescribed were this technique. That was in 1990, so who knows now?

Here are some photos from my first patient in the study. This patient is a severe pronator. I will never see the patient, and my technique is being compared with another technique, and being critiqued on how well it stabilizes the patient. During the research design, those involved decided on 25 Degree Inversion Correction, 35 Degree Correction, and 50 Degree Correction as the 3 orthotic devices to be made for this patient with the 2 techniques. It is a double blind study, or at least single blind, since I will never see that patient. These degrees of correction are equivalent to 1/4" correction, 5/16" correction, and 3/8" correction of the foot. If you use standard beliefs, the knee position of this patient walking would be corrected 1/2", 5/8", and 3/4" (so very significant). I developed the technique working on knees. 

Here are the 3 sets of casts from the same patient.

These 3 sets of casts are set to Invert them 3 different degrees.

The nails used set the casts at 25, 35, and 50 degrees of Inversion.





No comments:

Post a Comment

Thank you very much for leaving a comment. Due to my time restraints, some comments may not be answered.I will answer questions that I feel will help the community as a whole.. I can only answer medical questions in a general form. No specific answers can be given. Please consult a podiatrist, therapist, orthopedist, or sports medicine physician in your area for specific questions.