Running is not necessarily a pain free activity and up to 75% of athletes might get an injury every year. More frequently that not this exercise related injury is not sufficient to stop them running and they commonly simply have to back away a bit and make use of some minor treatments to let it get better. Sometimes the injury is significant enough that it makes the athlete to give up on the sport. There are several injuries that could happen to athletes, impacting on many different parts of the lower limb. Among the most frequent injuries is what has become called non-technically as top of foot pain or ToFP. Medically this is called dorsal interosseous compression syndrome. This is an overuse injury which causes pain on top of the foot, typically about the top area of the arch of the foot. This typically happens in barefoot runners and runners who are more likely to forefoot strike rather then heel strike first whenever they are running. Running this way is likely to try and push the front foot upwards on the rearfoot which causes the jamming of the bones of the dorsum of the foot, producing the pain in that area.
Initially top of foot pain is treated with ice to deal with the inflammation and perhaps anti-inflammatory drugs to settle it down. Most runners will need to reduce their weekly mileage to also help settle it down. The best way to take care of this is to work with more of a heel strike when running and make use of foot orthotics to keep the rearfoot up so the jamming in the midfoot does not happen. Even though the change in running method might be an effective way to help this, it is not easy to undertake, which is often avoided originally to try and treat the problem without doing that. In the event the other approaches do not work, then a change in the running technique is most likely indicated.
