Plantar Fasciitis

Plantar Fasciitis Heel Pain Treatment and Relief


Do you absolutely dread standing on your feet getting out of bed in the morning or after sitting for a period due to the stabbing pains on the bottom of your foot/feet?

Have you tried stretching, massage, night splints and orthotics without any significant or long-term relief of that debilitating heel pain?

Have you been told that the only path to decrease your plantar fasciitis heel pain is injections or surgery?

If you answered ‘yes’ to any of these questions, you may have plantar fasciitis and you are not alone. Fortunately, there is a little-known answer to your plantar fasciitis heel pain or foot pain that can provide amazing relief literally within minutes.  We will explain the details of this amazing treatment breakthrough below, but let’s gain a greater understanding of your foot pain or heel pain that may be due to plantar fasciitis.   

Plantar fasciitis is a relatively common condition that affects roughly 10% of the population sometime in their lifetime.  Though the exact cause/causes for this condition is unclear, the risk of suffering the condition increases if:


  • You have high-arched feet or flat feet.
  • You wear shoes that don’t support your feet (especially for a long time on a hard surface).
  • You’re obese. (70% of patients with plantar fasciitis are also obese.)
  • You’re an athlete.
  • You’re a runner or jumper.
  • You work or exercise on a hard surface.
  • You stand for prolonged periods of time.
  • You exercise without stretching your calves.

Plantar fasciitis symptoms may include: 

  • Pain on the bottom of the heel, or nearby.
  • Increased pain after exercise (not during).
  • Pain in the arch of the foot.
  • Pain that is worse in the morning or when you stand after sitting for a period of time.
  • A swollen heel.
  • Pain that continues for months.
  • A tight Achilles tendon. (80% of people report this symptom.) Your Achilles tendon connects your calf muscles to your heel.

Typical plantar fasciitis treatment approaches that may provide relief for some sufferers.

  • Stretching your calf muscles.
  • Wearing supportive, sturdy, well-cushioned shoes. Don’t wear sandals or flip flops that do not have a built-in arch support. Don’t walk with bare feet.
  • Using appropriate shoe inserts, arch supports, or custom-made foot orthotics.
  • Using a night splint to reduce tightness in the calf muscle.
  • Manual therapy from your physical therapist
  • Putting ice on the area three to four times per day for 10 to 15 minutes.
  • Limiting physical activity including prolonged standing.
  • Taking over-the-counter nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) like ibuprofen (Advil®, Motrin®) or naproxen (Aleve®).
  • Losing weight.
  • Using crutches.

A large percentage of patients will not have substantial benefit from these more conservative treatments.

However, there is a therapeutic technology that has been proven to provide welcome relief to heel and foot pain when other conservative approaches have failed.  

This technology has its revolutionary evolutionary beginnings in the 1970’s in what was termed lithotripsy which was the generation of acoustic waves through a water medium to pulverize painful kidney stones to allow their passage painlessly.  Over the decades, it was eventually realized that there were some interesting biophysiological responses to acoustic waves at the tissue and cellular levels.  Scientists discovered that when the evolution of the acoustic waves began as a shockwave, there were ever-more positive immediate and longer-term healing and pain reducing effects at the cellular and tissue levels.  

This little-known technology that has only been available recently to the rich and famous is now within reach for everyone.  It is termed Extracorporeal Shockwave Therapy (ESWT), but often referred to as “The Stem Cell Machine” due to its ability to stimulate local stem cell production and healing activity to help resolve even the most stubborn of chronic pain and injury.

In other words, this patented technology (a product of SoftWave Tissue Regeneration Technologies, Inc.) can improve injured areas at the cellular level by turning on (or restarting) the body’s natural healing process… giving Shockwave patients their lives back.

In addition to its pain reducing effects, Extracorporeal Shockwave Therapy restarts and enhances your innate healing abilities.  More specifically, this triggering of the natural healing process (as revealed from a multitude of scientific research) results in:


  • Increases in blood supply
  • Decreases in inflammation
  • Stimulation and activation of resident stem cells
  • Repair, remodeling, and regeneration of tissues
  • Acceleration of wound healing
  • Induction of antibacterial effect
  • Reduction in acute AND chronic pain

When this technology is utilized with those with a diagnosis of plantar fasciitis, who have not responded to previous conservative treatment, there is a significant reduction in their chronic pain and improvement in all objective functional measures in 80 to 90 percent of those patients.  This has resulted a notable decrease in the needs for more invasive treatment approaches including surgery.

What are folks who have experienced shockwave therapy treatment for their plantar fasciitis pain saying?

Meet Sara.  She was suffering from excruciating heel and foot pain for roughly a year without relief.  She dreaded getting out of bed each morning because she would be met with deeply sharp and painful foot/heel pain.  Conservative approaches had little to no effect.  This is what she had to say immediately after her second treatment session: “Oh, my goodness.  It feels perfect; there is no pain as I walk and stand!”  

Of course, even though there is potentially no further heel/foot pain after shockwave therapy treatments, it is important to explore possible weaknesses, tightness, and movement faults that may have contributed to the painful condition so that one may avoid the return of the condition in the future.  Therefore, having a qualified and skilled physical therapist provide the education and support is important, in addition to the amazing benefits provided from the shockwave therapy.

Learn more about An Optimal You Wellness Partner Check Bellah here.


Posted In - Physical Health