Med ripp off , to Hammontree and Hines

Med ripp off , to Hammontree and Hines

Phillipe Cartaya CPO

10/13/2006

Id like to address the posts by Mr. Hammondtree and Mr. Hines. Your insinuation that I either fabricated or exaggerated the case of My 51 yr old patient because I had a personal vendetta against the CPO in question is offensive. I wouldn’t and could not make up the many cases that I’ve seen in this area of, in my opinion, unethical , exploitive, and uncaring behavior. How about this one - 89 yr old bilateral BK I was called in to see last year. He had his prostheses made by the same prosthetist as in the case of the Rheo knee patient. This man had terminal cancer less than a year to live , and he wanted to be able to hit a golf ball again before his time was up . I was called in because the PT and the family were fed up with the other facility. The patient , diabetic, had some skin breakdown on both legs. When I stood him up he was standing on the BALLS OF HIS PROSTHETIC FEET. This was the way they were dropped of to him according to both the PT and the mans son. The PT had set up a time when he and the prosthetist could meet at the patients home to go over some of the problems he was having. He never showed , called or returned phone calls to the Therapist, or family. This isn’t a case were there was a change in this mans condition which caused a drastic change in alignment. It was a plain case of the prosthetist not taking the time to align the prostheses It took me no more than 5 minutes to align him so the feet were flat on the floor. The sockets were poorly made and causing skin breakdown. I casted him and fabricated new sockets for him and he was able to hit golf ball several times before he passed. The facts are the fact , and this is not an isolated case and certainly not a vengeful hallucination fabricated in my mind because I’m out to get somebody. I couldn’t come up with the egregious facts of most of the cases if I wanted to , and in this case reality is more unfortunate that fantasy.
            Addressing Mr. Hines I never stated nor implied that this kind of thing happens routinely in our profession . If we had a room of 100 prosthetists I would expect only a small handful would say the patient in my first post was a candidate or could truly ever use the expensive system he was given. Just a small detail ,because of the shock absorber and the improper resistance of the Ceterus foot the patient experienced an overwhelming extension moment at heel strike. Doesn’t matter how I feel about anybody this is the unacceptable outcome of a people that seem more concerned with profit than with outcome. It still amazes me how some people can sleep at night , there are many a noght when Ill say to my wife “ I wonder how so and so is doing” Sometimes I wish I could keep work at work, but knowing I made a difference In these patients lives is what its all about.
  If this was a perfect world Mr. Hines then yes the facilities that have poor patient care would cease to exist , but unfortunately sometimes it depends more on who your “ friends “ are. Phillipe Cartaya CPO
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