Clinical Efficacy of Shoes and Custom-modeled Insoles in Treating Down Syndrome Children with Flatfoot

Objective: In this study, we performed a prospective study to determine whether wearing shoes and custom-modeled insoles can influence the walking pattern of Down syndrome (DS) children with flatfoot. Methods: Participants consisted of 41 DS children with flatfeet that were prescribed orthotic insoles. A 2.4 m sheet-type gait analyzer was used to analyze gait patterns. We measured the following variables: walking velocity (cm/min), cadence (steps/min), step length (cm), and single-limb stance (SLS) phase ratio (%) in three conditions. In the first condition, the participants walked barefoot, in the second, they wore shoes without insoles, and in the third condition, and they wore shoes with custom-modeled insoles. Results: When compared with the barefoot condition, significant increases in walking speed, step length, and SLS phase ratiowere observed in the group wearing shoes with custom-modeled insoles (repeated measure ANOVA; p=0.010, 0.000, 0.000). Conclusion: Our results indicate the clinical efficacy of shoes and custommodeled insoles in increasing walking velocity, step length and SLS phase ratio of DS children, which are determinants of gait maturity.