The Ponseti training symposum

[Guest guest]

A few have posted about there weekend at the doctors training symposium.

This past weekend and I had the opportunity to meet many families

and doctors at Iowa City. Meeting different families and putting names with

faces was wonderful!

At the training the many families were asked to come and show there child's

feet so that the doctors could see the appearance and function of feet

treated by the method at different stages of development. There were a 7

to 10 families there.

One thing that I was very impressed with was the dialog between the doctors

and the families. All the doctors asked questions regarding our child's

treatment. . I didn't ever have the impression from these doctors that we

the lay people and were " beneath " them. No question was treated as a silly

question. All were very personalabile. For instance note the quote from

one of the doctors for s post.. " Doctors are not scientists, like most

people believe. We're more like technicians. We're just like anybody

else. We put our pants on one leg at a time, and we have biases just

like anyone else has.... "

had stated that " Some wanted to know how they could get their

names on Dr. Ponseti's qualified doctors list. " Many of the doctors that I

spoke with appreciated the parents that were at the training and there

involvement. It was mentioned many times that it was because of parental

involvement and " research " that had sparked the increased " popularity " of

the Ponseti method. One doctor who was trained in the Ponseti method from

the beginning... who stated that he didn't use any other method of treatment

of idiopathic talipas equiovaurse ( useless a case needed to of course)

" That the pediatric orthopedic community is a small one... He felt that part

of the increase number of attendants was due to more patients families

asking about the Ponseti method and seeking trained doctors in the Ponseti

method. " Dr. Ponseti mentioned this at the appreciation dinner too. That

point was stated by at least four different doctors that I spoke with.

In 's post about the inner city doctor ... and parental involvement.

.. " Several of the physicians believed the Ponseti technique requires

more parental involvement than surgical treatment would, and in some

situations it just is not appropriate because of that factor. One

doctor I spoke with works in an inner city hospital. Sixty percent

of his patients are on public aid. Many of his pediatric patients

have parents or guardians who simply do not care for their kids. He

was telling of an emergency case that occurred just last Wednesday. A

five year old boy had a cast applied after some elbow surgery. The

boy was brought into the emergency room with maggots literally

crawling in his infected flesh. A neighbor brought the boy in

because of the smell. The parents simply could not be bothered to do

routine cast care to prevent this problem. Doctor's quote: " Stuff

like this happens all the time that makes me want to cry. " In this

type of environment, the doctor cannot expect a parent to apply a DBB

every night for two or three years. This doctor believed that

surgery was the only option for these children. "

and I were also there when this doctor was talking about the maggots.

I asked what was done after surgery... shoes, AFO's....etc. He stated that

after the cast, pin removal etc That he always prescribed a AFO to be worn

for at least a year after surgery.

what were the results of the survey you did on this list? Are not

most put into some type of orthotic after surgery? What I am trying to say

surgery or nonsurgical methods have to have parental involvement for optuim

results after correction.