Are podiatrists trained to treat "common" sicknesses?

[bluemouse]

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I know that pod's are physicians and specialists in the foot and ankle, but are they trained (maybe during residency) to treat more common things, like cold, flu, ear infection or bronchitis?

 

[JackedUp]

I am a first year podiatry student, and as far as training is concerned, yes we learn about common sicknesses and how to treat them. And during our clerkships we will definitely be exposed to all different aspects of illnesses. However during residency and practice, it wouldn't make sense to treat common illnesses because
1) this is usually a referral based profession
2) why would some one with a common sickness come to a podiatrist?

As far as schooling and training is concerned we should be able to handle common sicknesses.

 

[hamlinbeach]

maybe one of the residents can comment, but I'm pretty sure you get a healthy dose of medicine in your first year of residency...thus being responsible for many types of illnesses

 

[air bud]

i have two brothers that are MD's and they both said they would have no problem hiring me for moonlighting on weekends and doing basic physicals, exams, etc...

 

[iceman69]

This may offend a few people who frequent this forum, but alas someone has to say it. DPMs are foot and ankle specialists, and more specifically, most are surgeons. Why would you want to go to school, specialize within your education, and furthermore in residency to become a Foot and Ankle specialist only to treat maladies that do not fall within the purview of your legally defined scope of practice? It would be unethical for a DPM to manage HTN, DM, hyperlipidemia, and any other sort of chronic condition in a clinical setting outside of a hospital. There are people who specialize in medically managing the aforementioned and similar conditions; doing a rotation or two and attending a couple of lectures does in no way make you qualified to plan and deliever this type of treatment plan. If you want to be a sub-specialty surgeon and not spend the rest of your life as a resident, then podiatry is a great career choice. From my experience, the podiatry service has similar take on H&P's, and medical management as the orthopeadic service at large, let the medicine boys do it. Afterall, it's what they were trained to do, and they do and damn good job at it.

 

[streetsweeper]

I know that pod's are physicians and specialists in the foot and ankle, but are they trained (maybe during residency) to treat more common things, like cold, flu, ear infection or bronchitis?

First of all these simple pathologies are nothing compared to what you will exposed to during your training. You will be doing rotations where you will diagnose and treat (under supervision) during your clinical years..and you will be seeing and managing these things and a lot worst (i.e. medical emergencies, heart attacks, cardiac failure, renal failure etc etc) before the start of your residency. Examples of clnical rotations: Internal medicine, general surgery, orthopedics, infectious diseases, pathology, gerontology.. and much much more...and you will get your hands dirty!!

Hope that answers your question.

 

[jonwill]

I know that pod's are physicians and specialists in the foot and ankle, but are they trained (maybe during residency) to treat more common things, like cold, flu, ear infection or bronchitis?

Yes, we do a lot of "off rotations" which are required. I'm actually on plastics right now. We see a good deal of general medicine.

 

[bluemouse]

Thanks. all great responses and answered my question completely! 👍

 

[GymMan]

Yes, we do a lot of "off rotations" which are required. I'm actually on plastics right now. We see a good deal of general medicine.

At what point, as a resident, can you be held responsible for a mistake or error on a patient? I'm wondering if a non-systemically trained DPM resident is involved in a complex patient, way beyond the scope of podiatric medicine, will you still be expected to have the same expertise as does a MD/DO resident trained in a more whole-body treatment model?

 

[jonwill]

At what point, as a resident, can you be held responsible for a mistake or error on a patient? I'm wondering if a non-systemically trained DPM resident is involved in a complex patient, way beyond the scope of podiatric medicine, will you still be expected to have the same expertise as does a MD/DO resident trained in a more whole-body treatment model?

You always have an attending physician over you so in the end, it comes down to that person. Obviously, the residents on that service will know more about the specialty than the rotators so they are a lot of help as well.

I would hope that DPM's are all systemically trained as the leg is connected to the rest of the body. While only the residents of a specialty will know the complexities of that specialty, we should at least know the basics. Especially when it comes to medicine. For instance, if a patient becomes tachycardic and hypotensive, that's not good!!!

 

[krabmas]

At what point, as a resident, can you be held responsible for a mistake or error on a patient? I'm wondering if a non-systemically trained DPM resident is involved in a complex patient, way beyond the scope of podiatric medicine, will you still be expected to have the same expertise as does a MD/DO resident trained in a more whole-body treatment model?

As jonwill said there is always an attending over you as well as 2nd, 3rd ... years to verify things with. Typically once you call your more senior resident or attending and document in the chart that you discussed your treatment plan with them and they agreed if something then goes wrong the blame/responsibility lays some with them. Not all because you still wrote the order.

At my program we rotate with med, gen surg, vasc surg, ortho trauma and limb salvage/plastics at G-town. We take the same call that all the other residents on these services take. For gen surg and vasc surg we are the intern on call for the floor patients. We get called for vital sign abnormalities, lab abnormalities, patients sats declining, NG tube fell out, patient vomiting repetatively, patient popped sutures in abdomen when they got out of bed to move the bed, patient is NPO and has a headache - and oh yeah - they had a lumbar puncture yesterday. We also do the post-op checks for all these patients. The most important thing to know for all of this is to know when to say that you are not sure and call your second year.

For ortho trauma we are the ortho trauma resident (only one) in the hospital when on call for all broken bones including spine every other month. Last night I had a guy with a pelvis broken in 5 places and thru a tibial pin for traction, a lady w/ a sub trocanteric fx, a possible compartment syndrome of the arm from a too tight cast present to the ER.

My first patient that I admitted on medicine my first day of medicine and first night on-call was a guy with a pericardial effusion w/ tamponade physiology. Of course there are people around to talk to like my 2nd year and the attending on the phone but they are not sitting next to the patient watching the bp plumet to 70/40. You are, and you have to know when to call and what to say and to sort of have a plan to present.

I don't know if this really answers your question but yes you do need to know more than just feet and at the right program you will learn that.