Osteoporosis and foot fractures

By Adrian Bianco|2024-05-15T01:45:15+00:00August 21st, 2022|

$Osteoporosis and foot fractures$

Osteoporosis is a common but non-foot specific medical condition that can affect your feet. In some cases, the first sign or symptom can indirectly present in the feet. Osteoporosis is a disease that weakens your bones. The body constantly replaces old bone with new bone. When the body struggles to replace the old bone with new bone formation they weaken. This makes bones more fragile and easily breakable under physical stress. For obvious reasons, having a broken bone in your foot can be quite debilitating and restrictive in your daily life. Osteoporosis is more common in women over 50, but not exclusively. Men and younger people can still be diagnosed with osteoporosis.

Your feet support the entire weight of your body. Osteoporosis is known as being silent – often only becoming apparent or discovered when an unexpected fracture occurs. Such fractures can occur in the feet, in bones such as the metatarsals (the long skinny bones of the foot that connect the middle of your foot to the toes). Other common areas include the spine and hip.

What are the signs and symptoms of fractures in the feet?

Generally, in the foot, the metatarsals are more prone to fractures (stress or acute). Symptoms include:

increased & progressive forefoot pain when weightbearing
difficulty weightbearing
forefoot swelling, tenderness, warmth and bruising
pain on palpation

Many people don’t actually have specific symptoms of osteoporosis until a fracture occurs.

Diagnosis of foot fractures

A thorough history taking is very important for diagnosis and identification of the cause of foot fractures. With these types of injuries there are normally clear risk factors. On top of a physical examination of the area, our podiatrists will seek to identify risk factors/causes such as:

rapid increases in physical activity over a short period of time
prolonged & increased time on feet
exercise training errors
poor foot function
nutrition deficiencies
poor footwear
trauma

As podiatrists, one of the main red flags for further investigation for osteoporosis is the diagnosis of an unexpected stress or acute fracture in the foot. When one (or multiple) risk factors or obvious causes for bone injury are not present but a fracture is detected, this increases the suspicion that a medical condition like osteoporosis could be an underlying cause.

What can be done to prevent foot fractures associated with osteoporosis?

You will need further tests and management via medication from a GP for treatment of osteoporosis. For the fracture, treatment is situation dependant. Rest, a CAM walker, crutches or even surgery may be required.

Longer term, our podiatrists in Melbourne can assist when it comes to rehabilitation and prevention, parts of which can include but are not limited to custom orthotics, exercises, gait & footwear assessment. These treatments can help reduce risk in the longer term. Medication, exercise, lifestyle and diet changes may also be important in prevention.

So if you suffer from osteoporosis and have hurt or injured your foot, make an appointment to see one of our Melbourne podiatrists for diagnosis and treatment.