The CurePPaC Study - Analysing Non-surgical Treatment Strategies to Cure Pes Planovalgus Associated Complaints

Summary

Pes planovalgus, also called flat foot, is a common foot deformity characterized by a flattening of the foot's longitudinal arch and is accompanied by a dysfunction of the posterior tibial tendon ("posterior tibial tendon dysfunction" or "PTTD"). Early stages of this pathology are thought to be treated with non-surgical therapy options like foot orthoses (relief of tendon stress by mechanical unloading of the arch), strengthening exercises or basic physiotherapeutic measures. Recent literature clearly states the urgent need for high quality studies to evaluate the proposed non-surgical treatments (Bowring 2009, 2010). There is only one high quality study available that shows benefits of orthoses therapy and exercise (Kulig 2009). No study to date evaluated functional changes pre-post in dynamic movement pattern like gait or stair climbing. The widespread use of several non-surgical treatment strategies lead to extensive financial expenses of the health care system. An optimized therapeutic strategy could eventually lead to more efficient health care investments. The presented proposal addresses this latest knowledge and aims to analyse non-surgical treatment strategies to Cure Pes Planovalgus associated Complaints (CurePPaC) in the CurePPaC Study.

Conditions

• Foot Injuries
• Posterior Tibial Tendon Dysfunction

Interventions

DEVICE

Foot Orthoses Only

patients wear foot orthoses as a treatment condition - no further therapy

PROCEDURE

Foot Orthoses and Eccentric Exercise

patients wear foot orthoses and they perform an additional home-based eccentric training program for the M. tibialis posterior

DEVICE

Sham Foot Orthoses

patient wear sham foot orthoses (control condition)

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Swiss National Science Foundation

  collaborator OTHER

• Insel Gruppe AG, University Hospital Bern

  collaborator OTHER

• Bern University of Applied Sciences

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Heiner Baur, PhD · Bern University of Applied Sciences, Switzerland

• Heiner Baur, PhD · Bern University of Applied Sciences, Health, aR&D Physiotherapy

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

SINGLE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Max Age

60 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2013-07-31

Primary Completion

2017-10-25

Completion

2017-10-25

Countries

• Switzerland

Study Locations