The College of Podiatry has brought out a series of excellent educational podiatry health care videos for pricate practitioners to share with their patients. One of these videos describe what an “At Risk” foot type is and discusses the importance of specialist podiatric care in looking after these particular patients. Rheumatoid and diabetic foot types can present a podiatrist with various challenges in ensuring good tissue viability and keeping patients pain free and mobile. It is not fully understood by many “At Risk” patients why they really need to take that extra bit of care and invest in their feet at all times to prevent major pathologies in the future e.g. amputation.
At Compleet Feet we do not just look at a pair of diabetic or rheaumatoid feet from simply a chiropody point of view e.g. nails need cutting and corns reduced, but we look further from a podiatric perspective to see how we can affect positive changes. We want to prevent corns coming back, arches ‘collapsing’, knee pain and ulcers forming. Alot of what a good skilled podiatrist can achieve for patients is preventative medicine; addressing potential problems before they become major issues or painful surgery is required. Too often we get patients who arrive at our clinic for the first time with painful conditions that sadly should have been treated a long time before. It is not to say that these particular individuals are doomed, as we can make many small changes to create significant improvements e.g. padding, education, corrective and supportive insoles. It is so important to us to get a patient walking out better than when they came in.
