The Effectiveness of Personalized Custom Insoles on Foot Loading Redistribution during Walking and Running

Abstract:

The objective of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of different hardness of personalized custom insoles on plantar pressure redistribution in healthy young males during walking and running. Six males participated in the walking and running test (age: 24±1.6 years, weight: 67.9±3.6 kg, height: 175.5±4.7 cm). All subjects were instructed to walk and run along a 10m pathway wearing two different hardness insoles (i.e., hard custom insoles (CHI) and soft custom insole (CSI)) and control insole (CI) at their preferred speed. Peak pressure, mean pressure, maximum force, pressure-time integral were collected to analyze using SPSS. The plantar pressure of forefoot and medial midfoot were significantly increased and of lateral forefoot and lateral midfoot were decreased by both kinds of custom insoles in running tests. While the CHI significantly increased plantar pressure of the medial forefoot compared with the CSI and CI both in walking and running tests. The custom insoles showed significantly higher plantar pressure on medial midfoot. But CSI seems better than CHI because of redistributing the plantar pressure by increasing the plantar pressure of whole forefoot. Moreover, CSI showed significantly lower plantar pressure than CI and CHI at lateral midfoot during running test. The CHI causes significant high pressure at medial forefoot (MF), which may raise the risk of forefoot pain.

• Periodical: Journal of Biomimetics, Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering (Volume 44)
• Pages: 1-8
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.4028/www.scientific.net/JBBBE.44.1
• Online since: February 2020
• Authors: Yao Meng, Li Yang, Xin Yan Jiang, Andy Wu, Yao Dong Gu*
• Keywords: Custom Insole, Footwear, Hardness, Plantar Pressure

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