‘A good fit?’
‘neo-liberalized’ healthcare system [36] , future
research in this area will continue to be
important. Research suggests that Podiatry
patients can struggle with self-care [8] , yet in
a climate of cuts and cost-saving measures,
it is likely that the onus will increasingly rest
on patients to manage their own conditions.
Therefore, research exploring the motivations
behind patient experiences and barriers to
change they encounter is timely and welcomed.
The consequences of poor shoe choices can
be significant, and increasing opportunities
for genuine, individualized dialogue between
practitioners and patients may help those
patients to successfully make ‘healthier’ shoe
choices that still align with their values and
preferences. This, in turn, may lead to improved
long-term foot health and ultimately reduce the
burden placed on the NHS [37] .
Conclusion
To conclude, it is clear that adopting a more
sociological perspective to healthcare research
on shoes and footwear can add an important
new dimension to our understanding of
patient behavior within or outside the clinical
encounter. Specifically, exploring patient
values, motivations and preferences in relation
to shoe choice can help to shed light on some
of the barriers to change that patients may
encounter when advised to adopt ‘healthier’
footwear. An understanding of the centrality of
shoes to people’s sense of self and identity may
help practitioners to recognize that changing
footwear practices is not a simple, rational or
neutral process. Rather, shoes may be intimately
bound up with a patient’s sense of who they
are — or who they want to be — meaning change
may not come easily.
The increasing use of more qualitative
methods – particularly innovative methods
such as shoe diaries and videos – offers
further opportunities for practitioners to really
explore patient values and priorities and their
relationship with their feet and footwear.
Moving forward, further use of in-depth
methods that are embedded into patients’
everyday lives and explore their daily practices
and habits will provide real scope to understand
the ways in which practitioner advice is
adopted, resisted or ignored (and of course
why this is so) outside and beyond the clinical
encounter.
NOTES:
Authors’ contributions Lisa Farndon, Email: [email protected]
EN, VR, LF and WV drafted the manuscript. All four
authors read and approved the final manuscript. Wesley Vernon, Email: [email protected]
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Victoria Robinson, Email: [email protected]
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