Gait analysis is often thought to be the panacea of care and diagnosis. I have seen it described on patient forums as being the 'Gold Standard', however I have to mostly disagree with this.

Gait analysis can be extremely useful in identifying 'poor movement patterns' that result in pain, however, if doing detailed gait analysis on someone who is currently in pain, then all I am doing is seeing what their movement pattern is for whilst they're in pain.

Given that the treatment may end up in a suggestion that you have insoles - and these can be costly - it does not make sense for me to start you down this route of costly treatment when your gait may change once you are out of pain.

I only really use gait analysis in the early phases of injury when my patients will definitely see a benefit. Mostly, I recommend my patients have a standard musculoskeletal consultation and gait analysis if recommended.

NB: Gait analysis can range from putting you on a treadmill for 2 hours if you are marathon training to watching you walk across the room a couple of times. I will be writing a guide on how to take videos for remote gait analysis. If you are wanting this before the blog is written, please get in touch below.