Joyce's KP Adventure mikepasini.com headlines
At the Podiatrist
9 May 2024
Joyce finally got to a podiatrist today. It was quite an event.
Three years ago Alice took Joyce to a nail salon. That was the last time she'd had her nails trimmed properly. Since then she's been trying to do it herself with occasional help from me.
But they'd gone too far for my help. I took a photo of them and sent it to her primary, asking if Kaiser's podiatry department would treat her.
We also asked the occupational therapist who visited recently (and found Joyce didn't need her services), who recommended Stonestown Podiatry Group if Kaiser wouldn't treat her.
Kaiser does have a podiatry department but it only takes patients who neuropathy issues or severe diabetes. The occupational therapist told us to mention wound infection as a concern ("Works every time," she said) so I menntioned that to Joyce's primary.
No luck.
So yesterday I made an appointment at Stonestown and today we went to the appointment with Jasper Lee.
She struggled filling out the forms. First in the waiting room, later in the exam room and finally at the office. But they helped her through them.
Her podiatrist was a little alarmed at having such a hard time finding a pulse in her ankles. He couldn't feel it with his hand so he tried a sonogram. That took a bit of effort, but he confirmed there was a pulse.
Venus incompetence is the problem. The blood vessels are narrowing. She needs to walk more to avoid an angiogram to clear them.
He suggested her primary do a vascular study.
He apologized as he went to work on her nails with a clipper the size of a a pair of pliers. It's going to be painful, he explained, because as the nail has thickened, blood vessels have grown into it and with them nerves.
He had better luck with a Micro-Air Orthofex podiatry. Gradually he cut the two biggest nails on each foot down.
It isn't pretty, he said, but the goal today is to improve things, not make them perfect. They have to dry out now because they are still moist. But the drilling cauterized the blood vessels so they won't grow back into the nail.
Meanwhile, at home, she's to file the nails with a metal file (aggressively) and soak her feet in a micro-antifungal bath every other dayr for 10 to 20 minutes. That stuff alone costs $75 but lasts the three months it takes to get rid of the fungus he found.
She finished her forms in the office and paid the $200 new patient fee. We'll see how it goes before making a return appointment in three months.