Podiatrist performing Limb lengthening

[hematosis]

I read this article today in the PM News . It was about a California podiatrist performing a limb lengthening procedure on a patient who had a 2 inch leg discrepancy due to a car accident.I had no idea podiatrist are allowed to perform this procedure. Is this possible? Further, I thought the scope in California was below the medial malleolus.

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[NeilD]

This is interesting? I've been researching this will older real world guys who said this was going on in Georgia years ago but don't hear about it much now. It is a real "grey zone" because although it involves the ankle area that may include or not include all areas related to the ankle. 50 states have 50 different definitions of scope which makes it hard for universal acceptance of what is legit and what isnt? Every State has a different "grey zone"? Confusing?

 

[NeilD]

Are you a foreigner? New to the country? Just curious.

 

[hematosis]

Here is the link for the Ca podiatrist performing leg procedures. Its being marked for cosmetic purposes now. I find this incredibly interesting. If you can get breast implants and nose jobs, IVF, face lifts, etc why not cosmetic procedures to grow taller? As long as it is safe and the physician is well trained, it could be a new niche for podiatry.

http://www.podiatrym.com/letters2.cfm?id=57897

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nrc-3fl4jRY

 

[hematosis]

If it ain't broke don't fix it. Limb-lengthening should done on patients who NEED it, not to make the guy w/ a napolean complex to grow a couple inches taller to make himself feel better.

There was girl that I grew up with from back home. She was born with one leg significantly shorter than the other. For awhile her family chose not to address it and remarkably she was able to participate in sports and play with the rest of us when we were kids. Then they decided to address the issue and she spent pretty much all of middle school, high school, and even some of her college years undergoing limb-lengthening procedures to eventually lengthen her leg. Today you would never know she had that issue. It took a long time to finally correct. This procedure was intended to address these kind of patients. It was never originally created to help people grow taller for cosmetic purposes.

If more pods get involved in limb-lengthening for cosmetic purpose it would erase any legitimacy this profession has achieved. All this comes down to is someone looking to make a quick $$$.

You make a valid point. But if you think about it, plastic surgeons aren't viewed as less legitimate because they provide face lifts and breast enhancements. I know that we are not at the level of MD/DO's (yet), where we can pretty much do these questionable procedures and it will be well accepted in the medical community. Our profession is always under scrutiny. I also agree that it would be farfetched to do something like this for cosmetic procedures now. However, it could be a future possibility for podiatrist to use this technique for patients that actually have some underlying pathology. Provided that the podiatrist did a residency and fellowship that did a lot of these cases and the state allowed for such procedures.

 

[MaxillofacialMN]

If more pods get involved in limb-lengthening for cosmetic purpose it would erase any legitimacy this profession has achieved. All this comes down to is someone looking to make a quick $$$.

I'm confused by this statement. Why do you think this is the case? IMO, this is equivalent to elective cosmetic surgery, and plastic surgeons are generally regarded as the smartest, best surgeons in the field.

 

[MaxillofacialMN]

Podiatric medicine has come a long way and continues to become more and more mainstream but we are not out of the woods yet. A LOT of society doesn't even know what a podiatrist can even do. As mentioned on these boards before, some medical students don't even know and don't care to know what our educational standards are like...even at Scholl. There is still plenty of unfair bias towards the profession even though there are just as many instances where DPMs work in harmony with the MD/DO community.

Limb length discrepency is actually something podiatrists see quite frequently and can treat through proper orthopedic/biomechanical care (orthoses, shoe modifications, etc).

Marketing yourself as someone who can "cure" short stature would absolutely set everything we have worked hard for back to the beginning. The procedure is cumbersome and not simple. Anything could happen and it's not worth the risk to mess with a patient's normal bone structure only to gain an inch or two.

As for comparing podiatric surgeons to plastic surgeons there is no comparison. Educational standards at the majority of the podiatry schools are NOT on par with medical school. The APMLE is an absolute joke to the USMLE (the USMLE practice questions I did were better written than the questions on the APMLE exam).

This is all about trying to make easy $$$ on an "elective procedure"...A LOT of it.

Makes sense!