Leg Length Inequality, Low Back Pain and Heel Lifts

A classic but well referenced article by Dr. O. Friberg in Spine (Phila PA 1976) Sep;8(6):643-51. It has been refenced by other articles over 211 times.

Dr. Friberg studied 798 patients with uni lateral hip and or chronic and therapy resistant low back symptoms vs 359 patients that were pain free. He observed that 79% (highly significant percentage) of patients with pain also had a limb length discrepancy. Dr. Friberg also found that 89% of the patients with had the chronic/recurrent sciatic pain and/or uni lateral hip pain on the longer leg side of the body. When he corrected the leg length inequality with a simple shoe heel lift, a permanent  and mostly complete alleviation of the patients' symptoms was achieved in the majority of the cases.

This is an old but still very relevant article even for today's practitioners. How many patients come in with uni lateral hip and or lower back pain who are not examined for limb length discrepancy? Are these patients given a simple inexpensive shoe heel lift? How about the tens of thousands of patients who every year receive a total hip or total knee replacement surgeries with leg length inequality?

Measuring for limb length inequality on our patients with unilateral hip and low back pain should be performed routinely. Dispensing an inexpensive and simple shoe heel lift can alleviate many of our patients' long term and resistant symptoms.

Teri Green, info@atlasbiomechanics.com

About Atlas Biomechanics; Atlas Biomechanics is a woman owned sports medical manufacturer and distributor. It is one of the leading heel lift manufacturers in the world. It produces a full line of traditional heel lifts, plus the newest patent pending shoe heel lift, The Triple V Heel Lift, the only varus/valgus and variable height heel lift in production.