In early 2019 I got HyProCure implants installed in both feet. Now, almost three years on, here’s a brief update.
Did this procedure fix all of my problems the way I hoped it would? No.
The main benefit I have experienced is that I now have 95% less foot pain than I did before in my daily life. I do still have foot pain, but it’s much more limited and infrequent. The specific phenomenon of a very strong pain in my midfoot coming from out of nowhere never happens anymore. The act of just walking around no longer carries a significant risk of tweaking something leading me to limp for days afterward. So that’s a big and important win.
However, none of the other problems I suffer that are supposedly caused by flat feet improved at all. My knees are as bad as ever. I still have SI joint issues, and sporadically, back pain from top to bottom. I have a proper arch now in both feet and it has made no difference to anything upstream.
A very unfortunate negative consequence is that now, I can’t run for more than a minute or two, no matter what footwear I wear. It’s too painful. I also can’t walk on uneven ground. Anything that causes my foot to want to hyperpronate causes significant pain. That means I can’t hike, either. My body never really integrated the implant the way I hoped it would. I can still feel it in there when something tries to flex my foot the wrong way. Previously, my foot would just collapse, mostly painlessly, and hyperpronate. Now, if it tries to bend that way, it can’t because there’s a slug of titanium in the way, and I can feel it. To some degree, I am still having to consciously walk on the outsides of my feet to avoid that unpleasant sensation. It’s as uncomfortable now as it was just a year after the operation. It’s not improving.
To be clear, I was never a big-time runner or hiker before. But I had hoped that by fixing my feet, I might be able to do those activities more, and with less pain. Instead, I got the opposite result. I used to be able to do those things in a limited capacity, but now I pretty much can’t do them at all.
Would I do it all over again? That is a complicated question and I don’t have a firm answer for you. Would I take back the randomly-but-frequently-occurring severe foot pain that I experienced in my daily life, in exchange for a limited ability to run and hike again? I’m not sure that decision would make sense.
Am I happy with the outcome? Not particularly. HyProCure fixed everyday problems for me just getting around and going about my everyday life, but with the trade-off of losing the ability to run and hike. PT wasn’t going to help anything, and orthotics certainly weren’t working either. I don’t think there is a better option available out there today. Maybe in the future someone will come up with an approach that works better for me. I can always have the HyProCure implants taken out, but I’m not planning on it, unless things really turn south, or a much more promising treatment becomes available. Unless and until such a breakthrough is achieved, I will stick with these little pieces of titanium and focus on the good rather than the bad. It could always be worse.