Spacer
CuraltaAS324
Spacer
PresentBannerCU1224
Spacer
PMbannerE7-913.jpg
RemyFX125
Podiatry Management Online


Facebook

Podiatry Management Online
Podiatry Management Online



PMBannerG11_125

Search

 
Search Results Details
Back To List Of Search Results

02/05/2025    Chuck Langman, DPM

Why Podiatry School Applicants Remain Low (Aaron Solomon, DPM)

My take as someone who is closer to retirement
than just starting out is a little nuanced as we
can only see life through our own eyes. I did a
one-year surgical residency in the 1980s. I came
out being comfortable and proficient with forefoot
surgery. As I did more surgery, I realized I
wasn’t in love with it (and you need to be in love
with it to be great at it). I kept only to the
procedures I was comfortable with and never
ventured out of my comfort zone. I enjoyed far
more the people I was able to keep out of the OR
and the athletes I treated conservatively. Fast
forward to when I was about 50 years old and was
lucky enough to join a very large orthopedic group
that allowed me to be non-surgical and do
orthopedics and sports medicine all day.

I truly love what I do! I have a team of surgical
podiatrists and fellowship trained foot and ankle
surgeons to refer to for the cases that need
surgery. I also note that we have a large team of
nonoperative sports medicine docs to do the
nonoperative care that the sports medicine, joint,
hand, elbow and shoulder, and spine surgeons
don’t. I appreciate the comments of Dr Clark
about docs who promise associates the world and
create roadblocks keeping them from achieving
their potential. That said, I don’t think that is
the reason college students don’t apply to
podiatry schools. My son’s girlfriend is a 2nd
year medical student at an allopathic medical
school in Philadelphia. Approaching the end of her
second year and about to start rotations she still
does not know what specialty she wants to pursue.
How could she be expected to know that coming out
of college?

My son is pre-med and finishing his junior year of
college. He just returned from three weeks in
Portugal shadowing docs in a hospital that
included both surgical and non-surgical
specialties. He’s still not sure what direction he
wants to head in. The need for podiatrists that
don’t perform surgery is real. Perhaps a year of
internship followed by a surgical or non-surgical
residency would give PGY1 docs the ability to
choose a career path to their liking.

My thoughts are:
PGY-1 - combination of intro surgical skills and
medicine with the ability to scrub into high level
surgical cases. Really no different than what
first year ortho residents do.
PGY 2-3 (or 4?) surgical - everything that is
currently taught in residency
PGY 2 (or 3?) non-surgical - medicine, ultrasound
training including PRP, TENEX or Tenjet, sports
medicine, etc.
.
Chuck Langman, DPM, King of Prussia, PA

Other messages in this thread:


02/06/2025    Allen M. Jacobs, DPM

Why Podiatry School Applicants Remain Low (Aaron Solomon, DPM)

Recruitment? It is indeed a sad day that our
colleges have been compelled to develop strategies
to enhance student recruitment efforts. It is
depressing to hear a call for practitioners to
make efforts to recruit students. PM News readers
have expressed an eclectic universe of
explanations proposing the etiology for the lack
of interest in our profession. Many if not most of
these explanations are reasonable, and perhaps the
sum total of all of these propositions explains
the current disinterest in podiatry among college
undergraduates. Facts are what they are. There is
a demonstratable lack of interest in pursuing a
DPM degree. The numbers speak for themselves

There is no issue that the services provided by a
podiatrist are needed. The issue is whether a
podiatrist is needed to provide those services. As
other PM contributors have noted, services
provided by a podiatrist may be provided by
orthopedic surgeons, general surgeons, plastic
surgeons, vascular surgeons, physician assistants,
nurse, practitioners, general practitioners,
physical therapists, pedorthists, and others.

I am not suggesting that other healthcare
providers can provide services typically
administered by the podiatrist with the same
degree of expertise or skill. I am suggesting,
however, that there is not a uniqueness to the
disorders that we evaluate and treat. This is a
reality that needs to be confronted.

There are for example, many more podiatrists than
foot and ankle orthopedic surgeons. Yet, 70–80% of
bone joint surgeries performed on the foot and
ankle are performed by orthopedics and not by
podiatry. Corporations know this.

We have a mandatory three year residency program,
which is supposedly preparing individuals for
medical and surgical management of the foot and
ankle. From my observation, the majority of
emphasis is clearly in the surgical arena and many
of our graduates are ill prepared to provide
primary care podiatry services.

Furthermore, it appears that it will be
increasingly difficult to make a living, providing
primary care podiatry services.

I know many many young podiatrists who are doing
extremely well financially. These were generally
individuals who were motivated to learn and excel
at what they do. These individuals are working as
hospital employees, working within an orthopedic
group, or working for a general medical
organization. I know many podiatrists in private
practice who are similarly are doing very well
financially. The potential is certainly there for
individuals who are enterprising, competent,
caring, and maintain an up-to-date status with
reference to the services which they provide.

There is also the opportunity in podiatry to
supplement patient care income by dispensing
various product products which are needed for
patient management. Furthermore, as has been noted
by contributors to PM news, there there is the
potential to make a nice living with a cash basis
practice. An individual can make a reasonable
living as a podiatrist in the federal system. All
is not doom and gloom.

None of these observations change the fact that we
are not attractive to college graduates. Perhaps
they look at the frequency of services such as
nail care and feel that this is not something they
wish to spend their lives doing. I frankly think
this is understandable. A three year residency and
significant debt is not required to perform so-
called “routine care“ essentially dealing with
mycosis or toenail dystrophy.

I have made my particular position clear.
Individuals in this world are seldom familiar with
the term podiatry or podiatric . Our profession
has largely dissociated itself from the term
podiatrist and prefer the term foot and ankle
whatever. Others can provide similar services.
Orthopedics has the exclusive on broken bones and
joint replacements. We do not have the exclusive
on wound care. Gastroenterologists have the
exclusive on alimentary track disease. We do not
have the exclusive on skin disorders of the foot
and ankle. Gynecologists have the exclusive on
female reproductive health, and do not walk around
calling themselves ovary and uterus doctors.
Podiatrists do not have the exclusive on elective
foot surgical procedures. We can go on and on, I’m
sure you understand. We may want to sing this song
“nobody does it better “but the question is
whether patients or alternative medical providers
actually care. We are in the world of cost
containment and not quality care.

I certainly hope that the future podiatry is not
exemplified by the following from Macbeth; Out,
out brief candle! Life is but a walking shadow, a
poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon
the stage, and then is heard no more. It is a tale
told by an idiot, full of sound, and fury,
signifying nothing.

Allen M. Jacobs, DPM, St. Louis, MO

02/06/2025    Rod Tomczak, DPM, MD, EdD

Why Podiatry School Applicants Remain Low (Aaron Solomon, DPM)

Since late 2022, I have been submitting letters to
PM News and Dr. Barry Block has graciously been
publishing them for the profession to read. There
have been two main topics my submissions have
fallen into; 1. The issue of board certification
and the ramifications between the haves and have
nots and; 2. The severe decrease in the number of
students in the podiatry classes at the eleven
schools.

An honorable source who has nothing to gain by
lying has informed me that as of last week there
were approximately 300 applicants to all the
podiatry schools. This may not include the Texas
school in El Paso which has its own application
service outside of AACPM. The number 300 refers to
applicants going through AACPM. Schools offer
acceptance and seats. We have been trying to tell
the profession that there won’t be a need to
address the first topic of conversation, board
certification soon. There won’t be anyone to
certify nor will there be anyone around to do the
certifying.

This is analogous to two ship stewards arguing
over which one should be in charge of deck chairs
and which one should be in charge of the
shuffleboard tournament on the Titanic. The graph
of podiatry student enrollments has shown a steady
decline in recent years. It would be hard to
believe at this point that all 300 applicants will
matriculate giving the schools 30 students, on
average, per class. In 2023, 560 students started
podiatry school. In 2024, 338 students
matriculated as first year students. Should this
trend continue, the total number of all students
in every podiatry school graduating will be less
than our 1977 graduating class of OCPM or very
close to it.

Podiatrists currently in the field might want to
become aware of an economic reality approaching.
They won’t be able to count on selling their
lucrative practices. There won’t be any buyers.
Even a walk down the “K Mart Blue Light Special”
on aisle three memory lane will result in no
takers. There won’t be enough podiatrists ready to
incur more debt to buy your practice. There are
more left-handed, blond, heterochromic podiatrists
today than there will be podiatrists looking to
start practice in ten years. It will be a buyer’s
market and sellers can expect maybe three cents on
the dollar.

The three podiatrists at the local meetings will
sit there slack jawed with mouths open wondering
how this could have happened. They will be sitting
in the midst of the demise of a once proud and
flourishing profession and wonder how this all
happened. Some months ago, a podiatrist sent a
letter to this site relating a story about an
undergraduate student who visited another young
practicing podiatrist. The young podiatrist told
the undergrad student that if he had it to do all
over, he would choose something different for a
profession and advised the student to look
elsewhere in search of an occupation.

Granted, with all the DO schools opening, students
have more options. What we cannot allow is those
uncommitted students to neglect podiatry as an
option thinking for one reason or another that
podiatry is a less than profession based on a set
of letters behind the name of the practitioner. It
is, to say the least, an evolving profession,
maturing from the inside. This development can be
stymied by members of the profession who
continually debase and degrade what we do. Don’t
kid yourself, patients become aware these
podiatrists are ashamed of our profession.

We, the practitioners of the profession are the
only ones who can save what we now practice. If we
do nothing, the profession will die a slow and
painful death because those who are happy but do
nothing are outnumbered by the vocal complainers.
That often-misquoted line about the only thing
needed for evil to prevail is for good men to do
nothing is true. The miserable and the malcontents
in this profession are not going to step up and
save podiatry. In 2023 one of my late 1980s
students from Des Moines sent me a text agreeing
that this was a great profession, and he was
performing procedures we would have never dreamed
of. He said everything was great and I needed a
reality check. He said, “knowledge is king which
equals dollars and that’s where we are…My medical
knowledge is on par with other medical
professional (sic) out there…and if you ever wanna
(sic) know the real truth about our profession
just ask me.”

He has missed seeing what the profession has in
store, but he is exactly the type of person who
can save it. He is exuberant about podiatry. In
his text to me he said he is very sociable, and he
is. It’s time for him to use his great gifts to
show undergraduate students what a fantastic
profession this is before it reaches a vanishing
point, like the 1971 movie. We all remember Bishop
Berkely’s quote about a tree falling in a forest
and if no one is there to hear it, does it make
any noise? There are so many people who, if they
knew about this person’s practice and the joy he
experiences from it, the eleven schools would be
turning away students.

If every podiatrist who is not a malcontent, talks
to just one undergrad or high school student about
the satisfaction gleaned from helping patients
with foot pain, we would be a growing profession
rather than a shrinking occupation. It was one
podiatrist, Jerry Cashen, DPM who convinced me
this was a great profession, and I should consider
it for my future. Not a hard sell, just his
attitude and pride in what he did. He was a model
for the profession, and I don’t know if he knew
it.

Rod Tomczak, DPM, MD, EdD, Columbus, OH
StablePowerstep?121


Our privacy policy has changed.
Click HERE to read it!