Nicholas Campitelli, DPM | Akron Podiatrist | Foot and Ankle Surgeon

The Foot Doc Blog – Leading Blog on foot and ankle pain

Providing information on foot, toes, and ankle pain or deformities. Questions? Please ask them in the comments section below. Check out our Youtube and Instagram sites as well.

Pain medicine addiction has become an epidemic in our society. It is common to prescribe this medication after surgical procedures to control pain in our patietns. This pain is usually only severe for the first several days after a surgery and the medication should not be needed or used for weeks after your procedure. Doing so could lead to addiction and with that comes many horrible side effects. Here is a short video that National Geogrpahic recently posted on their website.


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More than likely the answer is "No", you will not need to have pins to fix your hammer toes. Many of my patients fear having their hammer toes fixed surgically because they are worried about having pins sticking out of their toe following surgery. This is an outdated way of fixing hammer toes as we now have many new options available for fixating the deformity.


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I recently blogged about plantar fasciitis and cortisone injections on my running blog and received a lot of comments back about cortisone being "harmful" or a "bandaid".  I would like to elaborate more on this controversial topic and help guide others to understand how cortisone can play a role in the healing process - SAFELY.


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There are many misconceptions about wound care which still exist today and are not helpful in healing wounds.  One of the most common ones is to let your wound air out. Each week I have a patient ask me the question, “shouldn’t I let this get air to help it heal faster?”.  The answer is no.  


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What is a hammertoe?  Its basically when your toe contracts so much that it assumes a curled or flexed position.  This can happen in the form of a flexible hammertoe or a rigid hammertoe. A flexible hammertoe can straighten out of you try to manually place it in a normal position.  A rigid hammertoe is one that is fixed or bony. Why does this happen? The answer isn't this simple, but here is a quick explanation.


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If you have every had an ingrown toenail removed and developed a reoccurent small portion of nail in the corner, it is called spicule.  This small sliver of nail will grow at the same rate of the full sized nail plate but will be a small detached portion of nail.  While it is nothing to worry about, it can be irritable and bleed if pulled out.  Many patients also describe that it catches on their socks and clothes and is painful.  


9318 ST RT 43, Streetsboro, OH

2660 West Market Street, Fairlawn, OH

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