The Best Shoes For Diabetics

Do you have diabetes? If so you should know that diabetes causes many problems for diabetics in their feet, ankles, and lower limbs especially as the condition advances and neuropathy sets in. In many cases people who have lived with diabetes for only a few years tend to have few if any problems with their feet however, as they get older and after they have lived with diabetes for a decade or more the feet slowly become more and more of a health issue. Especially if you have a hard time controlling your blood sugar you may have to start wearing special shoes for diabetes which are better designed to help you deal with your condition.

Wearing diabetic shoes are something that many diabetic patients want to avoid. For the most part many people feel that diabetic shoes either do not look good or do not really make a good impression on others. Many people living with diabetes will wear shoes for diabetes when they are by themselves but change into standard shoes when they are out in public. This is fine for most people with low risk profiles for major health problems but when walking or standing for long periods of time come into play for men and women who have severe diabetes, to the point in which they have lost some or all of their feeling in their feet, wearing shoes for advanced diabetes becomes vastly important.

If you know all there is to know about your condition and simply want answers then let’s first get this out of the way. Probably the best choice you can make in shoes to help you manage your diabetic foot care is to go with Drew Shoes which is a shoe company that is well know to provide top quality shoes that are perfect for people with diabetes.

Drew shoes have a long and trusted relationship in the medical community and they can dramatically help you manage the care of your feet, especially if you have late stage diabetes or neuropathy.  All you have to do is to take the right steps and wear them correctly.

Here are a few popular diabetic shoes by Drew for you to consider:

Flare Women’s Athletic Diabetic Shoe
A Very Popular Diabetic Athletic Shoe by Drew

Force V Men’s Velcro Therapeutic Athletic Diabetic Shoe
An Excellent Laced Diabetic Athletic Shoe by Drew

Traveler Men’s Therapeutic Diabetic Dress Shoes
One Of The Best Men’s Diabetic Dress Shoes by Drew

And here is a large collection of additional Drew diabetic shoes for men and for women all available on Amazon.com along with many related diabetic supplies.

Best Brands Of Diabetic Shoes

There are of course a number of different brands of diabetic shoes available to you as a consumer, some of which are more scientifically proved and others of which are on the cheaper knock-off end. These shoes have their positive and negative like any other but I will refrain from going into the details of these brands and shoes until later in the article.

Now assuming you are not yet familiar with the need for special diabetes shoes versus traditional shoes sold in stores you should know that diabetes is a disease which is a degenerative condition. Because it is degenerative you should understand that when you are first diagnosed with diabetes you probably don’t feel many effects of the condition. Your feet are probably OK, you probably don’t have to inject insulin or manage your blood sugar levels quite so closely but as time progresses the effects of the condition worsen and these areas of your life slowly become more important for you to be aware of and in control of.

Diabetes, first and foremost, is a condition in which your body is not fully capable of managing blood sugar levels. In people with type 1 diabetes insulin isn’t produced and blood sugar levels get too high. Diabetics of this kind tend to need to inject insulin to keep their glucose levels in check. If they take too much insulin they may need sugars to get their glucose levels back up into a safe zone.

On the other hand the majority of people with diabetes have type-2 diabetes, which is often considered to be self-inflicted or environmental. There are of course genetic predispositions for this condition to keep in mind however most scientific literature seems to show that people who are generally inactive and overweight tend to have high rates of type-2 diabetes compared to people who stay active on a daily basis and manage their weight more effectively.

In those people who develop type-2 diabetes their bodies slowly stop responding to the insulin they produce causing elevated levels of insulin to run through the blood stream and allowing blood sugar levels to remain high for extended periods of time. Eventually insulin and blood sugar levels return to normal zones but not usually before damage is inflicted.

See these posts for more on how to check your blood sugar levels and how to lower blood sugar levels naturally.

The main problem with insulin resistance and diabetes is that you may be able to manage these conditions somewhat for a long period of time but scientific studies have clearly shown that maintaining elevated levels of insulin in the blood stream as well as elevated levels of glucose over long periods of time can slowly cause damage to the body.  Given enough time and with enough severity of damage the body starts breaking down and eventually failing.

Diabetes And The Importance Of Diabetic Foot Wear

For many diabetics the extremities and the feet in particular are often one of the first areas to exhibit the main effects of diabetic neuropathy, a nerve disease often caused by the effects of diabetes. These poorly regulated levels of insulin and glucose slowly damage the nerves of the feet causing a decline in their ability to sense pain.

As sensitivity decreases damage to the foot become easier and easier to occur and the ability for the foot and lower leg to heal itself becomes less and less robust. In extreme cases the entire foot and lower leg can lose all feeling making it extremely easy for damage to the foot to occur.

In ordinary and healthy people when we feel pain we naturally step back and eliminate the source of the pain as it causes damage to our physical bodies. If however you can’t feel the pain your do not recoil from pain but instead unknowingly allow the damage to continue being inflicted until you notice it some other way.

For these reasons it is vastly important to find the right shoes for diabetes and wear them on a daily basis. Possibly in early stages of diabetes this is less important but in cases where foot sensitivity has decreased you have to protect your feet with the right diabetic shoes. These diabetic shoes are designed to both protect diabetic feet and minimize the risk of damage despite the fact that pain can sometimes not be felt.

Treating Diabetes With Proper Foot Care

Treating your diabetes requires active exercise and dietary considerations. These help maintain your health and slow the progression of the condition… but while you maintain these doctor prescribed treatments you should make sure to care specifically for your feet and lower legs.

Special Shoes For Diabetics

One of the best ways to care for diabetic feet is to buy the right shoes and wear them like it is the most important thing you could do for your health and lifestyle. Your diabetes may not get worse if you don’t wear the right shoes but you may have more complications and you may end up even losing a foot or a leg if you don’t take care of yourself and your body. Without the right diabetic shoes you will have more complications with your diabetes no matter how careful you are.

It is imperative that you take the necessary steps to ensure you care for your feet and legs. If you try to relay on simple awareness and monitoring you will likely fail. All it takes is one random stubbed toe that goes unnoticed to cause more problems than you will ever want to deal with. The best diabetes shoes will help ensure you avoid foot injury when you are unaware that it could be occurring.

What Are The Best Shoes For Diabetics?

Which are the best shoes for diabetics? They are the shoes which are perfectly conformed to your personal circumstances. This is obviously a loaded question. There really are no perfect shoe for diabetes because every person is different. Generally speaking the best diabetic shoes are shoes which are heavy duty and can protect the foot from abrasion but not so tough that they cause irritation inside the shoe. They also tend to be of soft materials and are usually shaped differently than regular shoes because people with diabetes tend to have feet which are shaped differently than most.

Diabetics, especially those who have had diabetes for a long time, tend to have feet which are a bit malformed compared to the standard foot. Because of this wide set shoes are usually a good bet for most diabetics as the wide foot and toe area allow for more room for the foot and cause less abrasion and rubbing while in motion.

Your best diabetic shoe will also cater to your unique tendencies. If you are a walker or a hiker you will want to find diabetic walking shoes or diabetic hiking shoes which have all of the features of standard shoes but designed in a walking or hiking style. Running shoes similarly will be designed differently as will climbing or sport shoes however the most popular shoes for diabetics will be casual or dress shoes followed by walking shoes because people with diabetes need to stay active to help control their condition.

In regards to the best looking diabetic shoes you will probably have to make that call yourself. Many people have many different tastes when it comes to the most normal looking diabetic shoes. My personal favorite are the diabetes shoes highlighted at the beginning of this article, Drew Shoes.  You may however have your own reasons to veer towards other brands and other specific types of shoes. These shoes are well known to diabetic patent and physicians alike and they have mass appeal and penetration. Just looking online you cans see that they have many positive reviews from tons of satisfied customers.

In addition to these shoes there are also brands designed to be more medically focused. For people with severe foot problems even standard shoes for diabetics may not be right. Some people need their shoes actually custom made to shape their feet as foot ulcers, infections, broken toes, blisters, bone infection, and deformities such as hammertoes and bunions can make standard protective footwear inadequate. In cases like these podiatrists can often prescribe medical shoes for diabetics, custom molded shoe inserts, and/or depth shoes. Therapeutic shoes however are what people with diabetes want to avoid however which is why you want to take care of your feet before major problems arise.

If you want some variety in your search for diabetic shoes you may want to look at the following brands, all of which are known to carry quality shoes for diabetes sufferers of all severity.

• Propet Shoes
• Dr. Zen Shoes
• CrocsRx
• PW Minor
• Drew Shoes
• Instride Shoes
• Orthofeet

You may find as you shop for diabetic support shoes that certain brands carry excellent shoes for some activities while other brands are better tailored for your needs for other activities. This is common and should be expected. The chances are very high that you will end up buying a few different types of shoes for various types of activities and each shoe may be made from a different manufacturer. Make sure to shop through all the different brands to get acquainted with what types of shoes they offer such as:

• Diabetic Running Shoes
• Diabetic Walking Shoes
• Diabetic Dress Shoes
• Wide Diabetic Slippers
• Basketball shoes for diabetics
• Tennis shoes for diabetics
• And casual diabetic shoes for around the house

Each manufacture has a large variety of shoes available for you to choose from but most have shoes designed for specific activities.

Additionally the best shoes for people with diabetes will change based on your gender. Just as men and women have different shapes and sizes of feet in conventional setting so to do the feet of men and women who have diabetes. For instance women may need or want high heels which are good for their feet whereas men may need large work boots for job sites and physical work.

You may also want to look into various types of combination shoes which are both gender specific and task oriented such as:

• Diabetic Athletic Shoes For Women
• Diabetic Croc shoes
• Diabetic dress shoes for men
• Diabetic insoles for women’s shoes or men’s shoes
• Diabetic running shoes for men
• Diabetic steel toe shoes
• Diabetic work shoes for women
• Diabetic high heels

No matter what kind of shoe you are looking for there are better shoes available to meet your needs. In future articles I will try my best to look at some of the more specific recommendations for various types of diabetic foot care needs, gender requirements, and foot and leg safety.

Proper Diabetic Foot Care

In addition to managing your foot care with the proper shoes you should also make sure to take care of your feet and legs with the proper socks, braces, and inserts, and other accessories. Diabetic support socks are very important as are custom molded diabetic shoe inserts which work similar to arch supports in that they are molded to help redistribute the weight of your body in your shoes to areas which are less prone to irritation, blistering, or ulceration.

The ankle as well as the calf is much like the foot in that if the affects of diabetes is bad enough damage neuropathic nerve damage can occur in this are of the extremities and cause problems in damage to the flesh and bone, slow healing, and potential infection and amputation. Making sure to wear the right protection for your areas which are at most risk is very important.

Exercises To Help Slow or Reverse Diabetes
Diabetes is a sliding scale of severity in most all cases. In developed cases of diabetes it is irreversible but in early cases or pre-diabetes stages medical findings show that progress can be made to combat the condition and potentially reverse it. The same activities and exercises that you take to try and reverse insulin resistance and prediabetes can also help in preventing the progression of diabetes from worsening. You should make absolute certain that you take all the right steps to exercise and eat right in an effort to slow the development on this condition.

What researchers have shown us so far is that a lack exercise is probably the number one cause of type-2 diabetes and is the number one way to help treat insulin resistance and pre-diabetes. It is also the best way we know how to stop the worsening of diabetes and extend the life of diabetics.

These are obvious reasons why buying the best shoes for diabetics is important and should be motivation for you to spend a little money and buy some high quality diabetic athletic shoes for your exercise regimen. After all you need to exercise and you need to protect your legs and feet so make sure you do it in the right shoes.

Tips For Buying Shoes For Diabetes

In summary, when you start searching for the best diabetes shoe for you make sure to look far a variety of shoes. Make sure you have shoes that satisfy all of your daily needs. You shouldn’t have one diabetic shoe and then wear conventional shoes when your one pair of diabetic shoes don’t look right. Make sure you have adequate diabetic casual shoes, dress shoes, athletic shoes, house shoes, and everything in between. Your feet and your health are too important.

Make sure to look for soles with heavy cushion, toe areas which are very wide. The tip of your toe should not come close to touching the tip of your shoe. Find shoes with stretchable leather and choose shoes with laces over loafers for a better fit and less rubbing or potential irritation… and above all make sure to carefully inspect your feet every day and especially when breaking in a new pair of shoes. You never know if they will work for you until you try them out.

Lastly I’d like to end with this informative video on proper foot care for diabetics. When you are taking the time to learn about buying the right shoes for your feet you should learn as much as you can about proper leg care for this condition as well.