Clinical Tests for Plantar Plate Tears In a patient with a suspected plantar plate tear, there are four ctests that can be performed by the podiatrist to help diagnose plantar plate tears. All four of these tests can easily be performed in about 1-2 minutes during the examination of the patient. These four clinical tests give the clinician a very good indication of whether a plantar plate tear is present and how severe the plantar plate tear may be. The Dorsal Drawer Test, first described by Tho