Previously, some media reported the news of the “expensive insoles” of a hospital in Jiangsu. According to the news, the spinal disease rehabilitation and treatment center of this hospital will sell the insoles with a purchase price of 260 yuan to patients at a high price of 2,650 yuan, with a gross profit of 2,000 yuan.

Many people exclaimed: “This is simply a huge profit.”

Whether the price of the “insoles” of this hospital is too high and whether it meets the specifications for the application of medical supplies still needs to be investigated by relevant departments. However, this is not an “ordinary” insole, but a customized biomechanical insole. It is biased to determine the “expensive” and “great profit” of this insole based on the purchase price (maybe only the material cost).

The insoles of NBA stars may be more expensive than shoes.

You may have seen NBA stars give shoes to fans after a game, but pull out the insoles. It is said that once, LeBron James forgot to pull out the insoles after delivering the shoes, relying on the on-site DJ to call the fans back, and then took out the insoles and then sent out the sneakers.

This is certainly not because James is too stingy. In the equipment of NBA stars, insoles are more expensive than shoes, and the cost may be thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars. Even if it is affordable, it is useless to send it out. Because the insoles of top international athletes are all custom-made, if they are sent out, no one else can use them.

Many problems require customized foot pads to correct

In the field of rehabilitation medicine, this customized insole is called a “footpad”. It can be seen from the name that the main body of the insole is “foot”, not “shoes”.

Everyone’s feet are different, and their exercise habits when walking are also different. Take off the shoes and look at the wear of the soles in reverse: some people wear badly on the inside of the sole, some on the outside, some on the heel, and some on the forefoot; even the same person, the left foot and the right foot The sole wear are not the same.

Natural foot deformities, unequal length of lower extremities, poor walking/running posture, or improper shoes can be seen from the stress on the soles of the feet. Moreover, because the joints are linked, the uneven force on the feet will follow the lower limbs up: the knee joint is most commonly involved, and further up, it may cause the waist, back and even the neck to be affected.

Unreasonable exercise posture is directly or indirectly related to many diseases, including plantar fasciitis, heel pain, hallux valgus, calf muscle involvement, meniscus injury, knee ligament injury, low back pain, and so on.

According to the different force characteristics of each person, different materials and thicknesses are selected at different positions to make customized footpads. On the one hand, it can give the foot the correct support, redistribute the pressure on the sole, and correct the biological force during exercise. On the other hand, it also corrects the movement posture by adjusting the “proprioception” of the human body.

What is proprioception?

Give an example to illustrate. After a lower limb fracture, a person’s movement posture will be affected. For a long time after the fracture is healed, although the physical body structure is intact, the movement posture may still maintain the state after the injury. In some cases, even after rehabilitation training, this state may last for some time or even a lifetime-this is the “proprioception” that is playing tricks. In this case, the normal proprioceptive input given to the body through the footpad can partially or completely rebuild and restore this state.