Clinical Trial of Footwear in Patients With Diabetes

A Seattle VA study indicated lower extremity ulcers preceded 84% of diabetic amputations. Nearly half of the events that ban the causal chain leading to ulcers and amputation were initiated by ill-fitting footwear. Other investigators report similar findings for injurious footwear in their diabetic patient populations. Yet, the efficacy of footwear in preventing ulcers and amputations in the high-risk diabetic population has received limited experimental investigation. A British descriptive study followed diabetic patients with healed foot ulcers for two years and found reulceration occurred in 72% of patients who resume wearing their own footwear compared to 26% of patients who continued wearing "prescribed" footwear. A Swedish cohort study identified individuals with a foot ulcer and reported their 1, 3, and 5 year reulceration rates at 34%, 61%, and 70%, respectively, without further specifying footwear components. In a German diabetic population the reulceration rate was 87% in-patients who abandoned their custom shoes and resumed wearing their own shoes compared to 42% of those who continued to wear their custom shoes. Unfortunately, none of these studies compared the single or combined contribution of therapeutic shoes or insoles on foot ulcer prevention. Nor did these studies address patient adherence to prescribed footwear; thus the actual efficacy of various footwear interventions in foot ulcer prevention in this high-risk population is still to be tested.