‘Flip’ Your Spring/Summer Footwear: Choose Healthy Support Instead

Warm weather has arrived, and inevitably you’ve kicked off your winter boots in favor of sandals and flip-flops.  But choose your footwear carefully. Flat-as-a-board summer sandals and traditional flip-fops can cause serious harm to your feet and the kinetic chain, as research shows.

Consider this: the average American takes 5,117 steps a day (though really, we should be taking more, between 7,000 and 10,000 steps according to experts—but that’s another post for another time). With each step, improper footwear can reinforce (and sometimes cause) degenerative changes in the muscles, joints and connective tissues of the feet. With the body’s foundation compromised, joint movement, circulation and proprioceptive input throughout the entire body may suffer.

Five thousand one-hundred and seventeen steps a day—more if you’re active—reinforces these problems every time your foot hits the ground. Step after step, day after day… after day after day after day….It should come as no surprise that dysfunctional feet can lead to chronic pain and problems throughout the body, especially in later life. (And guess what? Your feet may not even hurt, which is why it’s important that your healthcare professional assess them).

High-quality, supportive footwear, ideally with support for all three of the foot’s arches, gives the body a healthy, solid foundation that is less likely to experience problems like the ones mentioned above. Wearing custom orthotics in every pair of shoes goes a long way to give you the support you need, as can orthotic footwear and orthotic sandals. We recently introduced the Seabreeze and Midnight Breeze custom orthotic flip-flops, which offer all the fashion and comfort of regular flip-flops, but with healthy 3 arch support. Your healthcare professional can create a custom mold or scan of your feet from which we’ll create a flip-flop or sandal designed specifically for you. Want to find a Doc in your area who works with us? Click here.

P.S.! Coming soon, a custom orthotic flip-flop for men….