Why your feet burns

Dr Maxwell Adeyemi

The most common cause of a burning feeling in your feet is nerve damage, often related to diabetes, but there are other possible causes. The pain from burning feet can be intermittent or constant, and range from mild to severe. The feet may feel hot, tingling, prickling, or numb, and is often worse at night.

Causes

Diabetic neuropathy

Prolonged uncontrolled high blood sugar can gradually damage your blood vessels and nerves. High blood sugar reduces the transmission of signals from the nerves. This can affect sensation in various parts of the body, including the feet. High blood sugar also weakens the blood vessel walls that carry oxygen and nutrients to the nerves. The nerve damage can occur throughout your body.

The risk for neuropathy increases if you have obesity, high blood pressure, smoke cigarettes or drink alcohol. Peripheral neuropathy can cause a burning feeling in your feet. Less frequently, it can affect the arms and hands.

Small fibre neuropathy

Small fibre neuropathy is a painful neuropathy that often results in painful burning in the feet. There may also be a loss of feeling in the feet and short bursts of pain. It occurs as a result of a loss of the myelin sheath, which covers and protects nerve fibers.

More general symptoms can also occur, such as, fatigue, problems with thinking and focusing, headache, bone and muscle pain.

Risk factors include: exposure to toxins, including alcohol and some vaccines, infections, such as Lyme disease, HIV, and hepatitis C, immune system disorder such as rheumatoid arthritis and diabetes.

Alcohol use

People who consume a lot of alcohol are at risk of another type of nerve damage called alcoholic neuropathy. It can cause pain, tingling, and weakness in the feet, muscle weakness, problems with gait, burning pain and hypersensitivity to pain.

Charcot-Marie tooth disease.

This is an inherited nerve disease. It affects the nerves that control muscles. It’s a progressive disease, meaning symptoms worsen over time.

Symptoms include weakness or paralysis in the feet and hands, difficulty lifting the foot, a high-stepped gait, there may be muscle atrophy, when the muscles lose mass, cramping pain can also occur, ranging from mild to severe.

Complex regional pain syndrome

Complex regional pain syndrome occurs in a limb, most commonly after an injury or surgery. It involves nerve damage that affects the signaling from the brain and spine

Symptoms include: burning pain, tingling, hypersensitivity to a pain trigger, swelling, changes in skin color or texture.

Erythromelalgia

Erythromelalgia is a relatively rare disease involving red, hot, and painful feet without a known cause. The severity of the disease varies between individuals. Pain can worsen after: exercise, walking, standing, exposure to heat.

Vitamin deficiencies

A lack of some B vitamins in the diet can result in a sensation of burning feet. Nerve damage may stem from deficiencies in: vitamin B-12,vitamin B-6 and vitamin B-9 (folate).These vitamin B deficiencies can cause burning feet and muscle coordination problems.

Anemia, a deficiency in healthy red blood cells, may also be due to vitamin B deficiencies. Other symptoms of vitamin deficiency anemia include fatigue, dizziness, and shortness of breath.

Hypothyroidism

An underactive thyroid changes the balance of hormones in the body. It can lead to widespread symptoms, including nerve damage. Peripheral neuropathy may be an early sign of hypothyroidism.

Infectious diseases

Nerve involvement can occur with various infections, and this could lead to burning pain in the feet. They include: Lyme disease, HIV, syphilis, shingles.

Athlete’s foot

Athlete’s foot is a contagious fungal infection that can affect the feet, toenails, and hands. It is also known as tinea pedis.

A common symptom is itching between the toes or on the soles of the feet, but there may also be: blisters on the feet that cause itching and burning.

Kidney disease

When the kidneys stop functioning properly, toxins build up in the blood. Various complications can arise, including peripheral neuropathy, symptoms of which include burning foot pain.

Up to ten per cent of people with kidney disease may also experience swelling and tenderness in the lower legs with burning foot pain.

People who undergo dialysis may have burning foot pain due to nutritional deficiencies, as dialysis removes thiamine, or vitamin B1, from the blood.

Peripheral artery disease

Peripheral artery disease involves a narrowing of the arteries that bring blood to the legs and feet. The symptoms can be similar to those of peripheral neuropathy, including pain in the feet and legs. The pain is often brought on by walking or exercising.

Tarsal tunnel syndrome

Tarsal tunnel syndrome refers to a condition where the nerve that runs from the ankle to the foot is squeezed because of swelling or an injury. This can lead to a sharp, shooting, or radiating pain in the foot, which may extend up the leg.

Toxin exposure

Exposure to heavy metals and other industrial chemicals over long periods can lead to peripheral neuropathy symptoms. Some medications for treating certain conditions, like HIV or seizures, can also produce nerve damage.

Chemotherapy

Therapeutic chemicals used to kill cancer cells may have side effects, including peripheral neuropathy.

Other nervous and muscular systems side effects of chemotherapy may include: tired, achy, or shaky feeling in the muscles, slowed down reflexes or motor skills, balance and co-ordination problems, muscle weakness and pain.

Diagnosis

If you have painful, burning feet, consult your doctor who will first ask about your medical history, the medication you are taking, duration of your symptoms and then conduct a physical exam. A physical exam may indicate: structural problems in your feet or legs, fungal infection, skin changes, reflexes, lack of feeling or sensation.

The doctor may then order blood sugar test for diabetes, a common cause of burning feet, thyroid hormone, kidney function, test for vitamin deficiency, screening test for HIV and other infections.

Treatment

Treatment for burning feet depends on the underlying cause. Often, treatment can be straightforward.

• an antifungal prescription for athlete’s foot.

• more comfortable shoes.

• Vitamin B supplements.

• Thyroid supplements.

• Treatment of diabetes

• Electrical nerve stimulation

• Magnetic therapy

• Laser therapy.

Contact Dr Maxwell on 3631807 or 7575411