Today I was on a 15 minute Virtual Doctor Visit call with a runner who has been trying to get over a nagging case of Achilles tendinitis and still wants to do well in the Boston Marathon.

It may not surprise you to hear that he is worried about how skipping long runs to protect the Achilles tendon will make it very difficult for him to have a good run in Boston.

He’s been doing all the right stuff. He has taken the right steps to remove the inflammatory fluid around the Achilles tendon. He’s been doing the right supplementation routine to help rebuild the collagen. He’s been doing the right workouts to help break up cross-linking and reorganize the collagen alignment in the Achilles tendon.

He has been improving but, he had very mild setback, got a little swelling and it made him worried. So, he just wanted to have a quick call to talk about his progress and figure out whether or not he needed to stop running or shift to some different activity.

In 15 minutes we were actually able to come up with several different ways he could augment his training to add some longer workouts that wouldn’t put as much stress on the Achilles tendon.

This episode is based on a question sent in from one of our listeners and she actually wrote in and said “I mistakenly had “plantar release” done to my right foot 16 years ago. I am no longer able to run because my arch has collapsed and my foot now rolls inward significantly with every step. I’m in constant pain in both of my knees (because of the change in my gait) as well as my foot as a result. A Mayo Clinic orthopedic surgeon recommended fusing the first and second metatarsals above my arch to reduce pain affected by the release but who knows if I’ll ever run again, which is what truly breaks my heart. My main questions are could stem cell therapy help me run again and can it decrease pain in the long term? Long shot question- is it remotely possible to “replace” (using that term very loosely) the cut ligament or it’s role in the foot, also allowing me to run again? (which is most important to me honestly).”

Today on the Doc On The Run Podcast we’re talking about what a runner can do to help the plantar fascia after plantar fascia surgery.

Today on the Doc On the Run Podcast we’re talking about the special considerations overweight runners need to think about when they want to get to their goals without getting injured.

 I am really excited to have Gary Stotler on the show today and Gary is a guy who is truly inspirational. He actually went from 400 pounds to running 100 miles.

I’m really excited to have Dr. Stephan Guyenet as a guest expert today. Dr. Guyenet spent 12 years at the University of Washington as a neuroscience and obesity researcher. Much of that time he was studying the role of the brain in eating behavior and body fatness. His publications have been cited more than 1,400 times by other scientists and in peer-reviewed scientific publications. He is the author an intriguing book entitled “The Hungry Brain” which explores the neuroscience of overeating, focusing on the following perplexing question: Why do we overeat, even though we don’t want to?

One of the reasons I wanted to have him on the show is that I have noticed many injured runners and triathletes let their diets slide a little bit when they get hurt. When we talk about this it quickly becomes apparent that these athletes understand nutrition. They understand the value of quality ingredients going into their system. They know what they need to eat to recover from hard workouts.

Today on the Doc On The Run Podcast we’re talking about Stress Related Eating and the Consequences for Injured Runners.

Today on the Doc On The Run podcast we’re talking with Linda Hall about meditation and how to focus on the mind-body connection and stress management as a tool that runners can use to recover faster, decrease the risk of running injury and hopefully even recover from overtraining injuries.

This week I got a couple of calls from runners who had various different forms of foot pain and they both said the doctor they saw said they had a condition called synovitis. They were both understandably confused because neither one of them really understood what “synovitis” really means.

 Synovial tissue is the tissue that makes the fluid that lubricates your joints. The fluid on the inside of your joints is called “synovial fluid.”

This is the stuff that lubricates and nourishes the cartilage on the inside of your knee joint, your ankle joint and all the other joints in your body. This fluid not only helps to lubricate the joint it also nourishes and keeps the cartilage healthy.

On the inside of the joint you have this soft squishy tissue, called synovial tissue, that makes that lubricating fluid. Sometimes you may hear it called synovium. Synovium and synovial tissue are synonymous. They’re both the same thing but they are different terms your doctor may use interchangeably to further confuse you.

Today on the Doc On The Run Podcast we’re talking about synovitis in runners.

Sleep may be the most valuable, most abundant, least expensive, and yet most underutilized resource available to a recovering or injured runner.

If you are a runner, you are always recovering. You do tissue damage every time you run. If you run a little too much, or you run a little too far, you might get an over training injury. That overtraining injury is really nothing more than an exaggerated version of the intentional injury you are attempting induce when you are training.

Sleep Helps You Heal, Running Doesn’t Help You Heal.

Sleep is crucial for proper immune function, tissue healing and consequently healing after any hard workout or running injury. Sleep disturbances reportedly occur in one third of the U.S. population. Problems with sleep are so pervasive and detrimental that the Centers for Disease Control has declared insufficient sleep as a public health problem.

Interestingly, elite athletes have actually been cited as a group having poor sleep quality and reduced quantity of sleep in comparison to the general population. Why is that?

Today on the Doc On the Run Podcast we’re talking about how sleep is the recovering runner’s secret weapon.

It is just not surprising that runners ignore the early sensations they can signify the start of a running injury. What we have here, is failure to communicate. Your running injury didn’t start the day you called a doctor for help. Your running injury started weeks or months before you told anybody about it.

But I would be willing to bet that you knew it was there. Deep down inside, you knew something was wrong. Maybe you didn’t want to see it. Maybe you didn’t want to feel it. Maybe you didn’t want to acknowledge it. But I’ll bet you had some subtle clue trouble was brewing.

Today on the Doc On The Run podcast we’re talking about how communication can help prevent running injuries and help running injuries heal faster.

A goal is not a fantasy. A goal is not a dream. It’s a place you clearly want to end up. If that goal is important to you, I believe you can get there. No matter how far-fetched, outlandish, or seemingly difficult to achieve, there is always a way to get there.They set all kinds of goals for themselves, their families, their finances, and of course, their athletic goals as well.

For most people the process of goal setting includes some analysis of the past. Maybe your just look at how fast you have run historically. Maybe you look at how much money you made last year. Maybe you look at how much time you spent with your family. In all likelihood your goals are partly based upon your past performance.

Part of the reason we base or future upon our past achievements is that we want to make sure that our goals are achievable. After all, no one enjoys failure.

Today on the Doc On the Run Podcast we’re talking about how injured runners should focus on the goal.