Podiatric Non-Advertising

by Jarrod Shapiro, DPM
PRESENT Resident Editor
Botsford General Hospital
Farmington Hills, MI

Recently I saw an interesting TV commercial about a physician who gets a great idea. He does a bunch of research and makes the announcement at a press conference that he has invented a wonderful new machine. This new invention turns out to be THE FOOT. It was a cute commercial, and I dare say effective advertising. At the commercial’s end, though, I realized this was an ad for the American Orthopedic Foot and Ankle Society. I was disappointed to find out we podiatrists had nothing to do with this, and it brings up my question: Does the APMA effectively advertise the podiatric profession to the public?
My answer to this question is a definitive “no.” But the issue is more complicated than this. Is it really the APMA’s fault that our profession is not adequately advertised?

We’ve done an excellent job convincing much of the medical community that we are on par with, perhaps even more effective than, orthopedists when it comes to the foot and ankle. We still have some strides to make, but I’d say we’re well established with the medical community as the experts of foot and ankle care.

I wouldn’t say the same for the lay public, though. I still find myself explaining to people what I do as a podiatrist. As far as the general media, I don’t remember ever seeing a podiatry advertisement. We’ve spent a lot of time and effort educating our referring physicians about the services we offer, but what about the public? The APMA News lists events by podiatrists around the country, but most if not all are small scale local affairs without broad-reaching public exposure.

I don’t know if the APMA is culpable in any of this or not. We’re still a small profession, and much of the APMA’s money comes from dues, sponsors, and donations. We’re not the orthopedic society with a large fund of money to back us up, and I think everyone would agree the APMA has been quite focused on PPAC and helping to push laws through that help the profession, rather than simply advertising.

Here are my thoughts about what should be done in a perfect world. We’d have a media blitz that would include TV and radio advertising. Our top speakers would appear on national morning shows with significant visibility. We’d do the same as the pharmaceutical companies and target the lay audience with information regarding our services. Every podiatrist would get out of the office and do health fairs, screenings, and lectures. We’d advertise ourselves to every sports team (professional and amateur) in the country. Our residency programs would become national referral centers where severe lower extremity problems would be treated and receive national publicity. We’d fly children in from other countries to receive surgical care at these institutions. We’d do a much better job advertising our medical missions to various third world countries. We’d improve our research methods by pooling data from around the country instead of these virtually useless studies with 20 patients that tell us nothing.

And we’d continue to provide the best foot and ankle care in the world.

Unfortunately, we don’t live in a perfect world. We don’t have the time, money, and often the inclination to perform these tasks. I think some of these methods can be accomplished with some effort and leadership. The bottom line, though, is much of this requires money, which, as I hear, still doesn’t grow on trees. Is this an impossible conundrum? Am I asking too much from the community? Does it matter? What do you think? Write in with your thoughts.

As with all PRESENT publications, all issues of Residency Rap will be stored on the PRESENT  website, so if you miss an issue or you want to refer back to a prior issue, it'll be at:

http://www.podiatricresidency.com/residencyrap/