Monthly Archives: November 2014

Have Diabetes? Give Your Feet the Royal Treatment!

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Diabetic Foot Checks

Diabetes and feet—not always a match made in heaven, right? Well, let’s think about it a minute. Indeed, diabetes can make feet more vulnerable to life’s little problems, but, what if you gave your feet the “VIP treatment”? Would they respond?

The answer is usually yes. Like any other part of your life, special attention often pays off. Daily foot checks at home, regular professional skin and nail care, and annual podiatrist visits are all good ways to make your feet happy.

The whole secret to managing diabetes and feet is preventable maintenance. Just like your car, having a professional “look under the hood” regularly can keep you moving smoothly on down the road.

So, stop worrying. Let your podiatrist do the worrying for you! It’s his or her job to guide you on your foot health. It’s a simple task to give yourself priceless peace of mind.

Shoe Drive for the Holidays

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Soles4Souls InternationalSoles4Souls Domestic

The Holiday Season is upon us, and with it comes a time of giving and caring. This holiday season, Raleigh Foot & Ankle Center is partnering with Soles4Souls to collect shoes for children and adults in need all around the world.

We all have a pair of shoes or two sitting in the back of our closet, unworn in the past year. This year, instead of throwing them out or letting them sit unused, donate them and give the gift of shoes to a child or adult in need.

Throughout the month of November, bring your gently used shoes of any style or size to Raleigh Foot & Ankle Center and drop them in the bin located in our waiting room.

Your old shoes provide new opportunities in your hometown and give new hope in 127 countries around the world.

Soles4Souls is a Non-Profit Organization based out of Tennessee. They work to distribute shoes to people in need both domestically across the United States and internationally in countries all around the world. To learn more about what they do, visit their website.

For more information about the shoe drive, call our office at (919) 850-9111.

I Saw a Patient Today…

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Don't spend too much of today in yesterday.

I saw a patient today who came in for a chronic ingrown toenail. When we began to go over her medical history, it turned out that she had one particular episode about 20 years ago, which she seems never to have gotten over. This was a surgical procedure which she felt did not turn out exactly as she had wanted. Unfortunately, she could not seem to get past this event even though it was 20 years in the past. It almost seems as if every problem she had in the present was somehow related to that problem in the past. In taking her medical history, I just could not seem to get past this issue with her. Surprisingly, this is not uncommon. For this reason I have installed a little sign in each of my treatment rooms that says, “Don’t spend too much of today in yesterday”.

We all have limits in our lives. Each of us has a limited amount of money, time, physical energy, and even emotional energy. I have found that if we spend too much of this capital in the past, we do not have it available when we need it in the present. For example, if we have spent all of our money in the past, we will not have it when we need it for future uncertain events. In the same way, if we spend all of our emotional energy on trying to resolve an issue from the past, which we can actually never do, then we do not have that energy available to help us when something new comes up.

I have often suggested to my patients that they plan a session where they talk to me or some other trusted person as much as they want to about the past event trying to cover it in as much detail as possible. I tell them to go into as much detail as they feel is necessary, but at the end of that conversation, we will agree not discuss it again. It is then a good idea for them to not allow their mind to return to that event again. This is not easy to do, but one of my favorite preachers used to say that we spend too much time listening to ourselves and not enough talking to ourselves.

If we can accomplish totally putting these types of events behind us, and yes, even forgiving those who are associated with it, then our present lives will improve immeasurably and we will then have all of our available energies to address present problems and concerns, rather than just a portion of it.

I had one patient years ago who dropped by several months following just such a conversation and said that because of putting her particular traumatic event behind her that life had, after 20 years, taken a very positive turn. I know that this has worked for me and perhaps it may for you as well.