After I was examined by Dr. Smug, he told me the break wasn’t a big deal and it would just heal naturally on its own if I just kept my weight off of it. He said he could have me see one of the foot specialists in the building though. I agreed I should see a specialist — a break sounded too serious.
I was sent to a podiatrist in the “foot and ankle” section of the building. She looked at it and presented the scenario as having two choices:
A) I can let it heal naturally. She would give me a splint. She said it should heal in about six weeks, but it could end up taking longer or bone non-union (the bones not fusing back together) could happen.
B) I could have surgery, where she would screw the two bone pieces together in place and there’s the possibility I could heal sooner than the six weeks.
“I don’t want you to think one choice is better than the other,” she told me. But she had obviously been making surgery sound like a better idea. The prospect of not being able to walk for six weeks was daunting, and the glimmer of hope to walk sooner than that was not easily ignored. I told her I needed to think about it.
Because of her schedule, she said I needed to make my decision by the next day. When I told her I needed to think about it, that really meant I was going to google the hell out of it when I got home and try to get a second opinion from another doctor. I even posted on some websites to ask people.
In my research, it seemed that what most people did was just not use their foot. Surgery seemed to be more frequent in “Jones fractures” because those were located in a part of the foot that had difficulty healing or for people with badly displaced breaks. In my case, surgery just struck me as a little unnecessary.
I didn’t trust the podiatrist, so I canceled my appointment for the next day, and I found an orthopedic surgeon, perhaps the only one in the entire city that had availability the next day. (Seriously, there are not enough sports and orthopedic doctors in this area. I was being told November and December. “My foot is broken. I can’t wait that long.” This doctor had a cancellation so I could squeeze in.)
I told him what the podiatrist told me and he interrupted me: “You don’t need surgery. I’m sorry, I’m not trying to sound like a know-it-all, but surgery is totally unnecessary. I do surgery all the time and I wouldn’t operate on that.”
For whatever reason, I trusted this doctor more. He didn’t specialize in foot and ankle, but he was a bone doctor who said he had seen tons of these injuries and they always just healed on their own. He was much older than the podiatrist too, which made made me think he was more experienced and had seen more cases like mine.
The fact is, he could’ve easily made some extra bucks by recommending surgery, but he didn’t. In fact, he didn’t do anything that he could’ve billed extra for. He used the photocopies of the X-rays I had already taken — I didn’t even have an image disk or something high resolution — rather than order his own X-rays. He didn’t give me a cast or a splint — he said the Aircast I had gotten from the other doctor was fine. I should just wear it and not bear weight on my foot. I feel like the podiatrist was trying to make some extra money off doing surgery, to be perfectly frank — I’ve had doctors do that to me before.
So, I have gone the no-surgery, let-it-heal-on-its-own route. I am one week into it. Psychologically, I probably would’ve felt like I was being treated more if I did get surgery or a splint. But from what I’ve read, it’s okay to just rest the foot and let nature do its thing. I am nervous, but hopefully my bones are mending…
Broken Fifth Metatarsal 