2 Foot Productions

Basic Foot Care for Nurses and Carers across Australia

Callous What is Callous? What causes Callous? Where will you find Callous? What happens if you don’t look after Callous? What can you do to help?

What is Callous?

Callous is a build up of hard skin – often painless. An excessive build up of callous will turn into a problem if it becomes very thick and dry and splits open. When this happens, besides becoming painful, the underlying skin is then at risk of infection.

Corns are a build-up of hard skin, generally overlying an area that is subject to pressure. Corns are focal areas of hard skin, unlike callous – which is more diffuse. Corns appear as hard lumps of white or yellowish skin. They are generally smaller than a five cent piece and are tender when you apply pressure.

What causes callous?

Callous build up is a natural response of the body, to pressure and friction. In small doses callous is a good thing, protecting fragile skin in high impact areas from wear and tear.

Where will you find callous?

Common areas are over the ball of the foot and around the back of the heel. Callous can also build up in ridges along the sides of toes, and at the edge of a toe pad.

What happens if you don’t look after callous?

Callous can build up until it gets quite painful to walk on. It can build up to a point where it splits open, sometimes right down to the healthy skin where you can get bleeding and possible infection.

In people with reduced sensation, a build up of callous can go unnoticed. The callous builds up, putting pressure on the skin below, eventually causing it to break down, bleed underneath the skin and even ulcerate. This is quite a common foot problem for people with diabetes.

What can you do to help?

The first thing to realize is that you don’t need to panic about every little bit of callous you see. As mentioned earlier, it is actually a normal bodily response to pressure and friction. If the callous is painful however, or is splitting open, there is plenty you can do to help.

One of the best things you can do is rub cream into the callous regularly. Once and sometimes twice a day will be needed. Regular use of sorbolene can make a big difference. In particularly bad cases use a good heel balm such as Eulactol or Du’it.

If significant heel cracks are a problem, wearing socks and shoes with a closed in heel will make a difference too. A lot of cracked heel are associated with wearing thongs and sandals in summer as the weather heats up.

A pumice stone or similar device can be used to gently rub away some callous build up. Don’t try and remove the whole callous – just try to smooth away the rough skin and prevent more callous from building up.

If you have a big build up of callous to contend with, consider a visit to a podiatrist to get the feet back to a decent state, and then start with the steps mentioned earlier. The podiatrist will pare the skin back with a scalpel. This will then make your job a whole lot easier.

If the skin has split open, you need to treat the area like a wound and apply your basic first aid. It can be difficult to apply a dressing to a heel – try cutting a non-stick pad like so, and cutting the tape like this to help it contour to the shape of the heel. (Pictures coming soon)

Again, soft insoles to help cushion the feet or arch supports to spread pressure out more evenly over the whole foot can help make calloused feet feel more comfortable.

The same cautions apply for callous as do for corns, with regard to acid preparations and sharp devices for removing hard skin. If you feel that these are needed – consult with a podiatrist or doctor first.