Millions of Americans are troubled by chronic heel pain and other debilitating foot ailments, such as plantar fasciitis, Morton’s neuroma, and neuropathy. An age-old treatment that uses freezing cold temperatures to manage pain — cryotherapy — is gaining popularity in podiatric medicine and offering new hope for sufferers looking for a permanent fix for their foot pain, says the American Podiatric Medical Association.
One type of cryotherapy, called cryosurgery, treats foot pain by using very cold temperatures — sometimes as low as -94°F — to freeze problem tissue during a quick, minimally invasive surgical procedure. The procedure is performed under local anesthesia using a tiny incision that does not require stitches. A probe is used to freeze tissue in a 15- to 30-minute office procedure.
A 2007 study in the Journal of Foot & Ankle Surgery concluded that cryosurgery offers a highly effective treatment for plantar fasciitis without performing open, invasive outpatient surgery.
According to Dr. Brent Rubin, a podiatrist in Bradenton, Fla., who has performed cryosurgery on more than 150 patients, 90% of his post-operative patients reported either complete elimination or a large reduction in their chronic foot pain. “The wonderful thing about cryosurgery is that it doesn’t kill the nerve permanently. Nerve conduction regenerates six months to a year after surgery, which gives the patient’s foot time to heal appropriately,” says Dr. Rubin, adding that after the patient’s foot is fully healed, the pain should never return again.