10/19/2024    Paul Kesselman, DPM

CA Podiatrist Discusses Plantar Fasciitis (Michael Loshigian, DPM)

I’ve been a Costco member for years and admired
their optometry and hearing aide departments for
years. When my local Costco opened about 7 years
ago I had a long conversation with their Northern
Hemisphere chief of operations if their Optometry
department. He provided me with a significant
amount of information on how cost effective they
were and the scope of operation. I was amazed that
he was so free to divulge this amount of
information.

What I’ve learned as an observer and consumer is
that Costco is very ethical, cost effective and
stand behind their products and services and is
very sensitive to consumer sentiment. That being
said, the issue here with all orthotics for them
may be within each state‘s regulations for
providing foot orthotics. There are many states
which have no licensure requirements regarding who
provides custom orthotics (Ca and NY) while a few
select others (approx. 19) such as NJ and Fl have
very strict regulations.

Therefore while this practice of unlicensed
individuals may not be illegal in NY or Ca it is
in NJ and Fl unless the individual providing such
services has a professional license, such as
orthotist, pedorthist, physician (DPM DO MD). The
differences between the provision of hearing
aides, eyeglasses and orthotics is that Costco has
licensed professionals providing their hearing
sides and vision wear.

That being said a few years ago Costco had
withdrawn providing foot orthotic services across
the country. I am unaware of the reasons for that.
But it is clear they would shut it down again if
either utilization by consumers drops and / or
consumer complaints and sentiment sours over these
services. I am unaware of any actions by state
licensure boards to shut this down in states where
it is illegal or any actions by local state
components to get the corporate executives at
Costco to shut this down.

Thus the issue comes to ethics and potential harm
to Costco’s consumers and thus potential
litigation against Costco should the consumer be
harmed. Kevin West and others I’m sure can provide
some insight here on this, but I’d be rather
surprised if Costco’s legal department didn’t
already address this with consents and
disclaimers.

As for ethical harm and potential harm of this
practice will be much harder to prove. This
should be left to state components with assistance
from APMA to address. As a member of my state’s
insurance committee and chair of APMA DME
workgroup and member of the APMA Health Policy
committee, I assure you we will shortly address
this.

Paul Kesselman. DPM, Oceanside, NY

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