i was disappointed in the practice. i have a new baby, and because of covid can't take him anywhere. he's not taking a bottle so it's difficult to leave him with anyone.
the downtown office is closest so i headed there for an appointment during one of the ten hours they're open. the staff and doctors were kind, and i felt listened to. i'd lost a shoe insert and needed a replacement pair. i showed them the one i had left - a softer one - and they suggested a different type - a harder one - but we agreed on the softer version since those had been working for me for years. we did impressions of my foot and i was on my way!
when i came in the next time, the doctor i had seen wasnt there, and the inserts weren't the soft ones we talked about. they also had a hard edge digging into my (lack of) arch. it had been really hard to leave baby and my husband stayed home from work so i was very frustrated and sad. they told me i could leave them to get grounded (even though the machine was right in the back) or wear them and come back in a month and they could fix them or leave them and come back when the other doctor was in. i opted for making them sand off some of the hard edge (why would i leave and come back again for something that took 2 minutes?) and leave with them. i scheduled a followup visit for a month from then with this new doctor, dr. bianco, since their schedule was one i could work with. i was careful not to wear my inserts too often, increasing how much i wore them. the right one hurt though, and my back started spasming when i wore them too long.
after a month i went back in and dr. bianco were upset with me for not coming in when the first original doctor, haubelt, was in. he said i could have gone to one of her other locations, even though i told him those were twice the distance and more stressful to visit because of my baby. he expressed skepticism as to whether this was true. when i shared the issue about my back and how it coincided with wearing the inserts, he was also skeptical that this was related. ("lower back issues are complex and i doubt it has anything to do with the inserts."). since i still had the soft right insert i'd first come in with and the hard right one was the one i needed fixed, i left the soft and hard right inserts with them and asked them to model the hard right insert profile off the soft one. i left feeling unhappy with how the doctor made me feel (scolded and a nuisance) and happy that soon this would all be over and even if i had hard inserts instead of soft ones, that at least they'd fit and i wouldn't have to ever go back to these podiatrists.
i was having a hard time getting back in to pick up the final version, so the office was kind enough to send them in the mail. but when they arrived i opened the package to find my original soft insert and now a second newly made soft insert! so they could make soft inserts! but now i had an old soft insert, a new soft insert and a new hard insert, and no info about whether i could wear any of these together, why this one wS soft, why the original two hasn't been made soft to begin with etc.
i called to express my confusion and frustration at having three non-matching inserts. was i supposed to wear the hard and soft together? were they also making a new left insert that was soft? did i need to -- SIGH -- come back in? when they called me back, they were pretty short with me, telling me i needed to come back in to see the first doctor. when i explained the scheduling issue again, they were unmoved. when i asked why they made a soft insert now instead of the first time, and whether it could wear the soft and hard together, they said i'd need to come in with all three inserts to see the original doctor to work it out with her. when i said i didn't want to come in just to get an answer to a simple question she was very unhappy and annoyed with me and was more like well we can't help you and the doctor is with patients right now. when i said i was really frustrated about the expensive and timeconsuming monthslong process and about the fact i now had three different inserts after all that time, and that i would likely just need to find a different podiatrist to work with who was available more often and could get me what i wanted, it seems she wanted to say good riddance, and again said i could do what i needed to but that all i had to do was to come in to visit the doctor (on a day i couldn't make work, weeks out), with all the inserts (that they'd screw up) to get squared away.
all in all, i felt dr haubelt (the original doctor i saw) was kind but did a poor job listening to me about what i wanted and screwed up my inserts the first time around, leading to this confusing process.
the second doctor i saw, dr bianca, did have to deal with my disappointment, but was a real jerk to me and i think that got in the way of him understanding what he needed to do.
all in all, i would not recommend. read more