Clinical Insight.
Plain Language.

Evidence-based articles on lower-limb pathology, recovery, and the biomechanical thinking behind The Orthopaedic Sleeve. Written by musculoskeletal physiotherapists.

Compression is not offloading — Achilles tendinopathy
Mechanism

Compression Is Not Offloading

Three different pieces of physics share one word in Achilles work. Only one is a tendon problem, only one is a treatment, and the heel-lift trials set the honest ceiling for both.

Cody Loopstra
Case review — a push-off assist in relapsing-remitting MS
Case review

The Wrong Brace for the Problem

She asked whether it would help her walk further. I said I doubted it, because the device assists the wrong end of the ankle. One patient, an honest accounting, and everything that might be wrong with it.

Cody Loopstra
Mechanotransduction control in Sever's disease
Mechanism

Mechanotransduction Control in Sever's Disease

Those children had been in pain a mean of 10.87 months before anyone enrolled them in a trial. Rest is not a neutral dose, and the apophysis is an enthesis that needs load to mature.

Cody Loopstra
Can tight calves cause heel pain — patient guide
Condition · Patients

Can Tight Calves Cause Heel Pain?

Your calf and your heel really are one piece of tissue. That does not make the calf the problem, and it does not make stretching the treatment. What the evidence actually supports.

Cody Loopstra
Achilles Tendinopathy — Patient Guide
Condition · Patients
Guide

Achilles Tendinopathy — Your Recovery Guide

What chronic Achilles pain actually is, why rest alone doesn't fix it, and how Australian athletes like Quade Cooper and Nic Naitanui have managed it.

Achilles Tendinopathy — Clinical Guide
Condition · Clinicians
Guide

Achilles Tendinopathy — A Clinical Guide

Midportion vs insertional, the 2024 JOSPT CPG, the 2025 BJSM Delphi on loading, and why bent-knee calf raises matter more than standard heel drops.

Can tight calves cause heel pain
Contested evidence

Plantar Fasciopathy and the Calf

The continuity is real and the force coupling is measured. The capacity argument is a different claim, and three Australian datasets have looked for it without success.

Cody Loopstra
Plantar fasciitis — patient guide
Condition · Patients
Guide

Plantar Fasciitis — Your Recovery Guide

That stabbing first-morning step pain explained, why it's degenerative not inflammatory, and the loading work that actually helps.

Plantar fasciitis — clinical guide
Condition · Clinicians
Guide

Plantar Fasciitis (Fasciopathy) — A Clinical Guide

2023 JOSPT Heel Pain CPG, Rathleff's high-load protocol, the Achilles–plantar fascia continuity, and the ambulatory dose problem.

Shin Splints — Patient Guide
Condition · Patients
Guide

Shin Splints (MTSS) — Your Recovery Guide

When that burning shin ache crosses into bone stress, why the soleus is the muscle pulling on your shin, and how to come back to running safely.

Shin Splints — Clinical Guide
Condition · Clinicians
Guide

Shin Splints (MTSS) — A Clinical Guide

Reframing MTSS as a bone-stress continuum, Warden's consensus, risk factors, return-to-run frameworks, and the soleus periosteal traction angle.

Calf Strain — Patient Guide
Condition · Patients
Guide

Calf Strain — Your Recovery Guide

Grading, what to do in the first 72 hours, why the deep calf is often the reason it doesn't heal, and how Lance Franklin and Nathan Lyon came back.

Calf Strain — Clinical Guide
Condition · Clinicians
Guide

Calf Strain — A Clinical Guide

Gastrocnemius vs soleus differential, BAMIC grading, Green & Pizzari risk factors, return-to-play frameworks, and why "calf raises" is not an exercise prescription.

Soleus Tear — Patient Guide
Condition · Patients
Guide

Soleus Strain — The Calf Muscle Nobody Talks About

Why your "calf strain" keeps coming back. The soleus is the deep calf muscle most rehab programs underweight — here's why that matters for your recovery.

Soleus Tear — Clinical Guide
Condition · Clinicians
Guide

Soleus Strain — A Clinical Defence of the Underweighted Muscle

The architectural argument from Lieber & Ward, why soleus injuries are missed, the bent-knee loading prescription, and how the standard heel-drop protocol underloads the soleus.

Sever's Disease — Parent Guide
Condition · Parents
Guide

Sever's Disease — A Guide for Parents

Heel pain in growing kids explained without panic. Why complete sport withdrawal is overkill, what the load-modification approach looks like, and when to see a physio.

Sever's Disease — Clinical Guide
Condition · Clinicians
Guide

Sever's Disease — A Clinical Guide

Wiegerinck's load-modification framework, differential diagnosis in paediatric heel pain, parent education scripts, and the keep-them-playing pathway.

Anterior Ankle Impingement — Patient Guide
Condition · Patients
Guide

Anterior Ankle Impingement — Your Recovery Guide

"Footballer's ankle" explained. What that pinch at the front of your ankle actually is, why dancers and AFL midfielders get it, and when conservative wins vs when surgery is needed.

Anterior Ankle Impingement — Clinical Guide
Condition · Clinicians
Guide

Anterior Ankle Impingement — A Clinical Guide

Van Dijk's classification, bony vs soft tissue subtypes, conservative-trial criteria, surgical referral thresholds, and the kinematic adjunct option.

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