Hallux valgus can affect the entire kinetic chain(s)


Here at The Gait Guys we have been mentioning hallux valgus in many different clincial and biomechanical scenarios over the years.  Inability to stabilize this all critical joint is a severe handicap for the recipient. Not only is there a lateral drift of the hallux (big toe) which has its own challenges, but clients have a rotational stability challenge that makes anchoring the distal 1st metatarsal extremely difficult.  Often clients have few other options other than to begin strategies into lesser toe hammering and even flexion hammering of the hallux itself which does little than to further create the rotational vectors about the metatarsal head.  This is one of the most difficult problems to address let alone a remote changes of correction.  Surgery, when absolutely the last resort, has its own set of challenges to say the least.  
Impairing of the hallux-metatarsal interval makes toe off inefficient and can often lead to instability and pain that begins to impair the medial foot tripod, splay of the forefoot-rearfoot relationship, challenges the tibialis posterior and contributes to hip extension motor pattern impairment and thus gluteal function. These are all realms we have beaten into our readers heads over and over for years. 
The background of this study was "The aim of our study was to compare spatiotemporal parameters and lower limb and pelvis kinematics during the walking in patients with hallux valgus before and after surgery and in relation to a control group."
Here were their summary highlights from the study, things we have been saying for years and and could not agree with more:

Hallux valgus deformity is not only a problem of the foot's structure and function.
•Hallux valgus affects the entire lower limb and the pelvis motion during walking.
•Hallux valgus surgery itself solves only problems related with skeletal alignment.
•Hallux valgus surgery does not solve dynamic related problems that occur during walking.
•Hallux valgus surgery solves only consequences and not causes.



Hallux valgus surgery affects kinematic parameters during gait

Jitka Klugarova
http://www.clinbiomech.com/article/S0268-0033(16)30154-1/abstract?platform=hootsuite