What is the Knee to Wall Test? | How to Improve Dorsiflexion? | Thomas Clanton, MD

sportsfootankle...
In this video, Dr. Clanton discusses how to improve dorsiflexion and what is the knee to wall test. One of the most important things following foot and/or ankle surgery is gaining upward movement of the ankle, which is known as dorsiflexion. There are several ways to obtain dorsiflexion after surgery. One way is to preform the knee to wall test.
The knee to wall test is preformed by putting the toes of the unaffected extremity against the wall, and you lean into the wall with the unaffected leg until your knee touches the wall. You can gradually move your foot away from the wall to see how far you can go back while keeping the heel on the ground, and getting the knee to touch the wall.
Move the foot back away from the wall until the heel rises from the ground. This is the distance you can reach. Usually, that can be somewhere between 3-4 inches away from the wall. In some people who are very flexible can get almost 5-6 inches away from the wall.
Once that is completed, you do the same movement to the effected extremity. Typically, patients right after surgery will not be able to touch the wall with their knee. By working on stretching the Achilles tendon, and soft tissues and mobilizing the joint so that the patient can then move the toes away from the wall gradually and still touch the wall with the knee.