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Corns & Calluses
Corns and calluses are quite possibly the most common cause of a visit to the podiatrist they can be a real nuisance and in some cases down right debilitating. So…
What is callus?
Callous is thickened dead skin and can occur anywhere on the body where repeated friction and pressure is applied to the skin. The foot is the most common spot to see callous across the whole body because of the repetitive loading and pressure applied to it during walking. Callous often arises on areas of greatest pressure such on hammer toes, in between compressed toes or under the ball of the foot.
What is corn?
A corn is similar to callous as it still thickened dead skin at an area of increased pressure but corns tend to be more localised and have a deeper central core.
This core often makes walking on a corn feel like you have a stone stuck to your foot. The corn itself is dead tissue and has no nerve endings and as such isn’t actually painful but the pressure applied to the corn by contact to the ground drive this “stone” into your foot and causes pain to the healthy live tissue underneath.
What causes a corn?
Similar to callus corns are mainly caused by pressure and friction at spots on the foot that a subject to more pressure than they should be. This is normally to do with the shape of the foot and the way that you walk. Common examples of causes of corns are
- Hammer toes
- Arthritis
- Damage spots on the foot from trauma
- High arch feet
- Flat feet
- Limping or altered gait
How are corns treated and will they come back?
The great thing about corns is how easily they can be treated because they have no live nerve fibres corns can be carefully and painlessly removed by a podiatrist with a scalpel. No anesthetic or dressings are normally required and there is virtually no recovery time. You can very often walk into the clinic in pain and out in no pain.
As part of the treatment we can also consider trying to address the cause of your corn by using treatments like:
- Orthotics
- Footwear changes
- Padding and cushioning
- Surgery
These additional treatments can often slow down or stop the corn from returning if we can successfully address the reason the corns appeared in the first place.
Unfortunately in many cases corns will return because the most common cause of the corn, the shape of the foot and the way we walk will remain after treatment. It is often several months or even years though before they return and repeat removal can be easily performed.
Can I treat them myself?
We might be a little biased here but self treatment is not something we recommend. Corns require sharp instruments like scalpels to remove them which if used incorrectly can cause a lot of damage and result in infections and in worst cases amputations. Similarly corn pads that people routinely purchase from chemists contain salicylic acid which if used incorrectly can result in nasty chemical burns.
