Bunions in Florida

Hi, I’m Dr. Leo Krawetz of Healthy Feet Podiatry.

One of the most common foot deformities that is see in my office is the bunion. A bunion is an overgrowth of the first metatarsal bone at the base of the big toe. When it becomes overgrown, it also becomes extremely painful when wearing tight fitting shoes or even with normal walking in a wider shoe. The reason why it is become painful is because this joint is out of alignment and there are abnormal courses on the joint which causes the pain. Eventually, the pain in the bunion can becomes a chronic pain and this has to be treated surgically. In my office, I try to approach every deformity in a conservative manner before I can do surgery. One of the conservative treatments for a bunion includes getting rid of these painful symptoms of a bunion. What I do is I inject cortisone into this joint and that usually takes care of the inflammation. Many times, this is just a temporary fix and in most cases a person with a severe bunion has to have surgery to remove the bony prominence. To surgically correct the bunion, I make an incision on the top of the foot into the toe and I remove the bony prominent area. Most of the time, I have to make a cut in the bone and move this joint over until the joint is in a straight position and the toe is back in alignment. After the toe is back in alignment and after the foot is healed, the bunion pain is gone completely. This can be done in an outpatient surgery center. The surgery itself only takes approximately 45 minutes. The recovery time for a bunion surgery is usually 4 weeks in a surgical shoe and you are able to walk in the surgical shoe immediately after leaving the surgery center. The conservative treatment usually only gets rid of the symptoms and does not cure the bunion. If you would like to have this corrected or have a conservative treatment attempted before trying surgery, please contact me by visiting my website.