You are here

  • Home
  • Online First
  • Persistent pain in the Achilles mid-portion? Consider the plantaris tendon as a possible culprit!

Article Text

Article menu

other Versions

Download PDFPDF
Education
Persistent pain in the Achilles mid-portion? Consider the plantaris tendon as a possible culprit!
  1. Hakan Alfredson1,2⇑
  1. 1 Integrative Medical Biology, Umeå University, Umeå, Sweden
  2. 2 ISEH, UCLH, London, UK
  1. Correspondence to Professor Hakan Alfredson, Department of Community Medicine and Rehabilitation, Sports Medicine, Umeå University, S-901 87 Umeå, Sweden; hakan.alfredson{at}umu.se

https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2016-097360

Statistics from Altmetric.com

    Request Permissions

    If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.

    The plantaris tendon can contribute to persistent pain in patients who present with what seems at first glance to be mid-portion Achilles tendinopathy.1–8 Clinicians should consider the plantaris tendon when evaluating painful Achilles tendon conditions, particularly those that are not responding to treatment.

    Below are typical findings related to the history, clinical examination and imaging. A short treatment guide follows.

    Clinical case

    A patient presents with mid-portion Achilles tendon pain. Here are features that point to plantaris tendon involvement.

    History

    • Typically the patient has pain in the Achilles mid-portion, complaining of most pain being located on the medial side of the Achilles tendon.

    • The symptoms are often worse when running uphill, running in soft terrain and running …

    View Full Text

    Footnotes

    • Competing interests The author, Professor Alfredson, is the owner of the Alfredson clinic that provides the service described here. The outcome results in the treatment section are unpublished data from the author/surgeon.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.