07/07/2026    

RESPONSES/COMMENTS (CATEGORIZATION OF PODIATRIC MEDICINE)

RE: Podiatric Medicine is Allopathic Medicine

From: David Secord, DPM

 

I'd like to comment about people in our profession referring to MD and DO medicine as allopathic and osteopathic and then putting ‘podiatric medicine’ in a separate category, as if podiatric medicine wasn’t allopathic medicine.  

 

There are a certain finite number of medical theories out there, including allopathic, osteopathic, homeopathic, chiropractic, native American Indian pan-theistic naturopathy, witch doctors, Eastern Indian Ayurvedic medicine, and a few others. Allopathic medicine has as its basis the idea of pathology from disease state: bacteria, virus, prion, spirochete, genetic dyscrasia, etc. Unless I missed something critical in medical school, that’s the disease model we in podiatry follow as well. As such, podiatric medicine is allopathic medicine. Allopathic is not a synonym for "MD"; allopathy is a medical theory and one our profession follows.

 

Podiatry is often stated as wishing to compete with "allopathic" providers in the area, as if WE were not allopathic physicians. One of the myopic tendencies in our profession is to separate ourselves in like manner from allopathy, which makes no sense to me. Podiatry follows the allopathic theory of medicine. We ARE allopathic physicians and referring to ourselves as podiatric physicians with similarities to allopathic physicians (as if allopathy means "MD", which it obviously does not) shows either ignorance of what the term means or is a strange form of self-denigration I don't understand.

 

David Secord, DPM, McAllen, TX 

Other messages in this thread:

---

07/08/2026    

RESPONSES/COMMENTS (CATEGORIZATION OF PODIATRIC MEDICINE)

RE: Podiatric Medicine is Allopathic Medicine (David Secord, DPM)

From: Lawrence Oloff, DPM

 

The debate continues over a plenary degree, the end of podiatry, student recruitment, etc. There are certainly a lot of armchair generals weighing in on a solution. Many have good points to make and I do not want to make light of those. However, very rarely is a bright light comment made on chiropody in these posts. Dr. Jacobs did an excellent job highlighting the changes that many of us have observed on a prior post about podiatrists who are faculty in medical schools, leaders in wound care, the complex surgeries that residents are taught, and so on. Show your board certification credentials and the operating room is yours to practice in, just like any area of medicine.

 

I think of podiatry as a premier medical profession to enter that is just not marketed correctly and remains mostly unknown to potential students. Does the answer lie in making a cheaper pathway? Maybe. But I think many of the advancements of podiatry are due in part by following the structure of...

 

Editor's note: Dr. Oloff's extended-length letter appears here.