By Dr. Sarang Desai — Fellowship-Trained Orthopedic Foot and Ankle Surgeon Sports Medicine | McKinney and Flower Mound, Texas If you play or coach on turf, you've probably heard players say "turf beats up your body." As a foot and ankle surgeon who takes care of athletes, here's the honest version of what the research shows. Overall injury rates on modern turf and grass are pretty similar. But when you zoom in on the foot and ankle specifically, the picture changes: artificial turf is the...

By Dr. Sarang Desai | Orthopedic Surgeon, Fellowship-Trained in Foot & Ankle | Sports MedicineMcKinney and Flower Mound, Texas Barefoot running has been promoted as a return to “natural” movement—a way to improve technique, strengthen the foot and prevent the injuries supposedly caused by modern running shoes. Others portray it as a direct path to Achilles tendinopathy and metatarsal stress fractures. The science supports neither extreme. Running barefoot changes biomechanics, but it does not...

By Dr. Sarang Desai | Fellowship-Trained Orthopedic Foot & Ankle Surgeon | Sports Medicine McKinney and Flower Mound, Texas Peptides such as BPC-157 and TB-500 are promoted as ways to heal tendons faster, shorten postoperative recovery and return athletes to sport sooner. Online testimonials describe dramatic improvements in Achilles pain, muscle strains, ligament injuries and surgical healing. The combination is sometimes marketed as the “Wolverine Stack.” The marketing is persuasive. The...