Imagine this picture. You are in your 50’s or 60’s and you successfully run a 5K race. When the race is over it starts raining and you run for your car, only to step in a hole and sprain your ankle.
Talk about a bummer.
I didn’t see her until two years later. When I examined her the outside of her ankle was very swollen. Two years time and her ankle was still swollen!
A number of things happen when you sprain your ankle, but in her case the most significant thing was her talus bone was lateral. The talus is like a gyroscope. It’s the bone between your ankle bones that gives motion to the ankle.
In an ankle sprain this bone can shift. The most common way is straight to the side [lateral], which was the case with this woman.
The usual treatment for an ankle sprain is to rest, ice, etc., then start some strengthening exercises. This is all great, but it does nothing for the displaced talus bone.
Strengthening exercises need to be performed AFTER all bones are back in position.
It really doesn’t make much sense to attempt to strengthen something that is out of alignment. It’s an uphill, losing battle every time. In this case, the ankle will never be strong and solid with a talus out of place.
So, I determined which direction her talus had displaced and adjusted it. When it went back in, you could hear the sound ricocheting off the walls it was so far out of place. It was a nice loud clunk.
She just looked at me with a sigh and said, “that feels so good”.
What stunned both her and I was you could literally see the swelling going down in real time.
Two years of swelling was vanishing before our eyes.
A day later she reviewed our office…
