New to all this so having hard time adjusting to independent mom being in a nursing home. My mom, in the care center, has her toe nails clipped by a podiatrist that does everyone's nails every 3 months or so. A couple days ago he rushed in, spent 5 minutes, clipped her toes extremely short, cut her skin on one nail. She told him it hurts and it’s bleeding. He said awe that’s just a little blood. He put her socks and shoes back on and left. The nurses have been treating it with cleaning and some ointment. She has to keep her one shoe off and of course her toes are sore too as he cut them all too short. This impedes her walking. To me, this is completely unacceptable and she is paying 9k a month for her care. A nurse told me he is the only podiatrist that comes there and I am long distance and am unable to clip them for her. Mom said other patients complain about him. I'm frustrated as to what to do about this, any advice? Her being there has been hard adjustment for us and I'm trying to calm down before contacting anyone.
The obvious thing to do is to check the requirements for claiming to be a podiatrist where you are, and reporting the guy to the professional board which oversees podiatry. If he is wrong in his claim, or poor in his practice, the licensing board for podiatry should take it from there. Professional boards are quite keen on stamping out false claims particularly, but also poor practice.
"No, a podiatrist is not a medical doctor (MD), but they are considered physicians and are qualified to diagnose and treat foot and ankle issues:
Podiatrists earn a Doctor of Podiatric Medicine (DPM) degree after attending a specialized podiatric medical school. They also typically have a bachelor's degree in a science field, such as biology."
But I think there is still some sort of governing or accreditation body that has disciplinary power.
It should make no difference how "busy" this podiatrist is. He is reckless and then injuring people then billing Medicare to get paid for his it.
If you have access to it, read the contract. There may be a part there where the resident agrees to the facility providing all necessary services..
In any event, Medicare pays for this service, so the incident should be reported to them as well. Home Health is sent out by Medicare for wound care, btw, so you may want to get mom's PCP to order that service at no charge.
I'm sorry you and mom are going thru such a thing, and I hope her feet heal soon. It's disgusting how "professionals" are so UNPROFESSIONAL these days.
This podiatrist is taking care of the nails of all residents of the facility, alone. If there are say 150 residents, he would be doing all their nail care needs, probably in one visit.
This Dr. is not paid by the facility. He bills Medicare for his services. Since he is the only one who will visit, not much you can do but take her out of the facility to a Dr of your choice.
I am quite surprised at being that cavalier about this whole thing if this is a REAL PODIATRIST, because clipping enough to cause bleeding, were a patient diabetic or even with peripheral neuropathy, could be a deadly mistake, and this is why we consider it so important here on AC to tell people that the services of a podiatrist are covered by Medicare in order to prevent injury, which quite honestly can lead to sepsis, infection and death. My brother in his mid 80s died from a TINY sore on his shin going septic, and antibiotics being ineffective.
I would ask, in letter to administration, for a copy of their policy regarding filing a grievance and would file a grievance against this podiatrist, listing it exactly as you did to us, including the bleeding, the affect on mobility, the requirement for nursing staff treatment and the cavalier attitude. Unless this is all put in writing it will not be addressed. By federal law they MUST have a grievance policy.
I would write a letter about the incident and would ask if an incident report of injury severe enough to cause bleeding and medical treatment was reported. This should go to the administration.
Doesn't this fall under the resident leaving the facility as little as possible, better to bring services to them?
One facility my mom used when she needed to go to the hospital, she had to use the facility's transport service. There was a senior transport that could have transported her to her appointment, when the service rep found out the location, she said no, because it was a for profit (they only transport to not for profit locations). The transport the facility use, pay the full cost upfront or no transport. They did not accept insurance. lady at the facility was kind, still it was a business, another sway for the facility and the transport to make some money.