Healthy feet, healthy body Healthy feet are crucial for a healthy body. They help provide the foundation for balance, mobility and body posture. Your feet are complex. Each foot has 26 bones, 33 joints and a sophisticated network of nerves and blood vessels, as well as over 100 muscles, tendons and ligaments. This intricate network provides your body with information on your body’s stability and balance as you move through your day. Since feet are complex, problems with feet can be minor and annoying or devastating and complicated. If you’re like most people, you don’t spend much time thinking about your feet, except for times when you have a problem with them. Paying attention to the health of your feet becomes very important when you have diabetes, and it’s critically important when you have neuropathy in your feet, which is when you’ve lost sensation. As with many aspects of life, it’s much better to be proactive and prevent problems, quickly identifying and taking care of any concerns or changes, than deal with them when they get worse. One of the simple, proactive things that you can do every day is check the health of your feet. If you find that it’s challenging to bend over or bring your feet up so that you can see them well, you can use a mirror that’s been placed on the floor or in a position that makes it easy to see each foot. You can also ask a friend, roommate, partner or relative to help you with this. Once you can view your feet well or have someone to help, inspect the tops and the bottoms of each foot. You will also want to check your toes and toenails. Take note of any concerning changes or developments and report them to your primary care provider. These include: • Blisters, especially any blister with blood. • Fissuring or cracks in the skin of the foot or toe. • Redness or swelling. • Callusing, especially with bleeding. • Foot wounds that are not healing. • Bruising without injury. Carson Valley Health providers accept new patients at all five CVH Primary Care offices, and Wound Care accepts new patients with a provider referral. Call 775.782.1550 to make an appointment. 2 Carson Valley Health • Winter 2025 HEALTHY CARSON VALLEY is published as a community service for the friends and patrons of CARSON VALLEY HEALTH, 1107 U.S. Highway 395 N., Gardnerville, NV 89410-5304, telephone 775.782.1500, website CarsonValleyHealth.org. Jeff Prater, MHA, Chief Executive Officer of CVH Information in HEALTHY CARSON VALLEY comes from a wide range of medical experts. If you have any concerns or questions about specific content that may affect your health, please contact your healthcare provider. Models may be used in photos and illustrations. 2025 © Coffey Communications, Inc. All rights reserved.
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