Bunions or hallux valgus almost always tend to be progressive. Once they start, because of the alignment of the big toe the muscles and ligaments pull on the joint in such a way that it will get worse. The bunions in different people progress at different rates and this will depend on things like your particular genetics, to what extent different structures are involved, what sort of footwear you are using and how active you are.
Once a bunion has started, there are a number of things that you can do to stop them getting worse. The first thing is the footwear that needs to be addressed. They must be wide enough in the forefoot to prevent them from pushing the big toe over further. This is crucial as unless this happens, the bunion will progress.
There are bunion exercises that can be done that will help to some extent. The exercises won’t fix or reverse the bunion, but they will keep the joint healthy and go some way to slowing down the progress of the bunion. They are more important to help with some of the pain that may develop inside the joint.
Bunion correctors are night splints that you can wear with the aim being to straighten the angle of the big toe. The evidence is that after a few months of use they can improve the angle of the big toe a few degrees, so that is some improvement. However, unless the width of the footwear is sorted out any benefit from wearing these at night can be undone by wearing bad fitting shoes during the day. Like the bunion exercises the bunion correctors are also very effective at helping some of the symptoms that affect the joint, so even though the improvement by using them is not that great, they are still well worth using.
