Health and Fitness

How useful are the bunion correctors?

Bunion correctors are braces or splints that are worn through the night and are intended to help the alignment of the great toe in those who have got bunions. Bunions are an enlargement of the big toe joint of the foot which is connected with what is called a valgus deformity of the great toe or hallux. The brace keeps the great toe or hallux in the correct place throughout sleep in order to correct the deformity. At this time there certainly is a lot of discussion as to if that works or not. The issue with the concept is that bunions are caused by a mixture of a hereditary element, foot biomechanics as well as the use of tight improperly fitted footwear. Thus during the day you will have all those forces producing the bunion and the hope is that using the bunion corrector during the night over comes those forces that happen when walking throughout the day, which is most likely not attainable.

And so must you use bunion correctors? There is some data that they can actually improve the angle of the big toe or hallux by a couple of degrees following a month or so of use. There's been no study completed to determine if that improvement will get any better with a long term use or if that improvement is simply non permanent if you cease using the splint. Even with that, a lot of experts advise still making use of them even when they don't change the angle position the toe much. The reason being, even though they do not fix the toe, they will likely still keep your toe mobile and flexible which is a good thing for your toe over the longer term as the bunion problem progresses. Along with by using these correctors it's also probably essential that you get specialist advice about the best shoes to wear to prevent the bunion from getting any worse as well as carry out some exercises to improve the muscle strength around the area.

Flora Wilson