For those of you who have attended my workshops at the last few PFOLA meetings, I wanted to provide close-up photos of one of the wood and rope foot models I constructed (with my son's help) a few years ago to demonstrate the mechanical effects of arch height, of metatarsal ray dorsiflexion stiffness, of differential medial to lateral column stiffness, and of plantar ligament and plantar fascia integrity on longitudinal arch load-deformation patterns.
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In this model, the pink nylon cords model the plantar arch ligaments to each metatarsal ray and the blue nylon cords model the digital slips of the central component of the plantar aponeurosis. Each plantar ligament and each slip of the plantar aponeurosis may be individually tensioned to different lengths (using sailboat cleats) to either load the plantar ligaments or plantar fascia more or less, depending on the demonstration desired.
This model very clearly demonstrates the mechanical effect that increased arch height has in increasing the forefoot dorsiflexion stiffness. This is much the same effect as is seen in a cavus foot that will have a increased forefoot dorsiflexion stiffness compared to the planus foot. This mechanical effect is caused by the increased distance between the plantar fascia and the bones at the apex of the longitudinal arch causing less plantar fascia tensile force for a given vertical load on the longitudinal arch of the foot.
This type of model can easily be constructed using similar materials by a student or podiatrist that has basic woodworking skills. Models similar to this should be used by every podiatry school to help teach podiatry students biomechanics and to let them "feel the forces" for themselves. This is a very powerful educational tool for those of you who do teach biomechanics concepts to students!
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