Wednesday 24 September 2014

Significance of Purchasing Safety Footwear for Workplace

You wear gloves while handling hazardous jobs. Often you put on aprons to protect clothes from staining. Head gears are used to shield the brain box from severe damage. This implies you are quite particular about protective wears. However, do you give the same attention to your feet? Actually no!

Often people, especially women, chose to pick up regular pair of fancy shoes to guarantee foot safety. This can be extremely risky more so if your job profile demands working in a perilous situation. Your feet carry the entire body weight and hence it deserves to be better protected.

Probably you have never looked at it this way but your feet are susceptible to serious injuries as you perform routine chores at home or workplace. There are few professions which demand handling sharp objects or heavy materials. This puts your feet at severe risk every day. Sometimes dangers remain of stepping on open wires accidentally. Even if you don’t deal with direct handling of heavy products, your foot still remains vulnerable to sudden injuries.

Take a normal office for instance. You may not need to handle electrical goods or heavy metal objects. Still accidents can happen anytime as you turn around the table, toppling that large wobbly jar right on your foot! Then if your job demands lots of field work or walking at a stretch, you might injure the foot from accidental tripping or spraining.

Those who are in creative sector may feel their feet are at lesser risk. Don’t be complacent because if you are into fashion designing and often deal with bales of clothes then keep in mind, your atelier may prove to be just as risky as any needle factory!

Therefore, irrespective of what profession you are in, it is never possible to predict when and how danger will strike, leaving you crippled! Thus the best way to keep your feet protected is by investing in some hardy shoes that guarantee maximum safety at the workplace. Heels look pretty and those glossy black oxfords can be trendy too. However, when it comes to purchasing safety footwear for workplace, think smart and give your foot health utmost preference.

Several aspects are needed to be taken into consideration when picking up the safety footwear. Figure out why you need it. Do you want to protect your ankles or toes from injuries? Does your foot need protection from abrasive machinery or should you think more of accidental sprain? Once you have sorted that out it becomes easier to pick footwear that fits your purpose effectively.

Safety shoes usually have symbols that help you identify their special features. Green and yellow triangles signify extra sole protection whereas white Omega rectangles are electric shock resistant. Grey and blue R rectangles are suited for puncture protection. Some footwear manufacturers point out grades of protection with number markings. The wisest approach is to visit a reliable footwear dealer and pick up renowned brands only to ensure best value for your money.

Before exploring the market, a good idea is to talk to a podiatrist to know what kind of footwear would best protect your feet at workplace.

Thursday 18 September 2014

One More Reason to Stop Smoking Today – It Affects Your Feet

Since time immemorial, you have been cautioned about the ill effects of smoking and tobacco. Numerous researches are conducted to scientifically prove how and why smoking affects your lungs. Thus, you know that smoking is a sure fire way to get lung cancer. Yet there are certain facts about smoking which you might not be aware of. This article reminds you why you need to give up smoking and give it up right now! Read on to learn how smoking can harm the feet!

How does smoking harm your feet?

You must be wondering if it is indeed true that smoking affects your feet as there is actually no clear connection between the respiratory system and foot. The answer is, the human body works in an interesting manner as every system in the body is pretty much interlinked. Therefore, smoking can definitely affect other parts of your body apart from the lungs or heart.

While enjoying that puff, you put excessive pressure on the respiratory system and in turn cardiovascular system. All these unwanted pressures negatively impact your body thus restraining it from functioning at its optimum levels. The feet being miles away from the heart gets much less blood supply when you are smoking. As a result a medical condition develops known as Peripheral Arterial Disease or PAD.

What is Peripheral Arterial Disease?

As the name indicates, Peripheral Arterial Disease is a condition which mainly impacts the cardiovascular system thus limiting blood flow to peripheral points of the body such as the feet. A kind of substance medically known as plaque accumulates in the walls of the arteries that run down to your feet. With plaque accumulation these arteries become narrow thereby hampering normal blood flow. The feet as a result suffer from poor blood circulation.

Signs and Symptoms

Podiatrists are of the opinion that the foot of a smoker can be differentiated from that of a non smoker by just looking at it. The latter’s skin will be thinner, shinier and darkish. A person affected by PAD symptoms may feel foot pain at times. In case he/she suffers from foot injuries, it won’t heal easily.

Sometimes, non-smokers can develop PAD too. However, those with smoking habits remain four times more vulnerable to PAD, than those who don’t smoke. In severe situations if the foot is subjected to improper circulation over a stretch of time, this might result in amputation too!

How to protect your feet from the ill effects of smoking?

Stop smoking for good if you seriously want to protect yourself from adverse effects of tobacco. Those who are indeed sincere about quitting smoking should try to avoid people who are into smoking. Talk to a foot specialist if you feel your smoking habit is in any way aggravating foot conditions. Those suffering from PAD must immediately talk to the podiatrist for necessary medication or if needed, a minor operation.

Consulting a podiatrist certainly helps bring your feet situation under control. Further they could offer valuable suggestions following which you can definitely keep your foot in better shape.