One Leg Shorter Than The Other
One leg shorter than the other. We very often get told this in an initial consultation that “I was once diagnosed by another practitioner that I have one leg shorter than the other. Is this normal?”
There are several ways that we can determine whether there is short leg. Physiotherapists are some of the best people to diagnose whether you have this. It is important to remember that it is a common condition, I’m not sure there is anyone with the same leg length it just depends on the scale of the difference.
There are two types of short leg:
- Structural short leg. This is an anatomical abnormality that has been present from birth. When you grow, one of the legs is genuinely longer than the other whether it be in the tibia or the femur. The bone is longer than the other side, which gives a short leg.
This is diagnosed by a X-ray. This is the gold standard to determine the level of the hips. Another way is to X-ray the legs and measure them in terms of their bone length, this is less common due to the fact that it is more complex and the x-ray can also be distorted.
- Functional short leg. This is where there is a rotation in the body be it from the foot, the knee, the hip or the pelvis, which is making it appear that there is short leg. This is much more common than a structural short leg. This is what physios are often diagnosing and the pelvis is the most common culprit of a functional short leg.
A functional short leg can be caused by posture, traumas and females that are post-partum. The pelvis can rotate. If it tips backwards, it will hitch the leg up. This would appear that that side would have a short leg.
Another way that a functional short leg can happen is if the arch in the foot is dropping over. This will cause the leg to appear shorter on that side as the foot rotates in, the knee drops and that side will appear shorter.
If there’s any rotation of the knee inwards, this again will make that leg appear shorter, causing problems in the ankle or in the lower back and the hip area.
How to Correct a Functional Short Leg
Doing glute stability work on one side. Single-legged glute bridges are a fantastic way to build unilateral stability through the glutes and make the pelvis function better. Check the video here
Single leg squats are also a great way to correct imbalances through the body and focus on one side more than the other. Have a look here.
Using orthotics is also a very popular way that podiatrists will correct a functional short leg. We do have orthotics assessments here at the clinic using a gait force plate, if you would like more info please let us know. More info here
Getting Chiropractor adjustments in order to restore balance with the pelvis and the lower back will help to bring the legs back into alignment from a functional standpoint.
Correcting a structural short leg, this is obviously very difficult to do. There’s an operation that from a young age would break the legs and pin them as you can see in the photo above. However this wouldn’t be considered later in life and only in children where the difference is significant.
Very often an orthotic is used on the short leg side to bring that side of the body up or even a cobbler is found to get the foot in the best position.
We can only do so much from a manual therapy point of view from a Chiropractic perspective to get the pelvis level. The rest, we may need some help from an orthotic.
If you’re concerned about whether you have a functional or structural short leg, then why not come in? We can assess you and point you in the right direction.
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