Podiatry - Ryde Hospital

Ryde Hospital podiatry provides a multi-disciplinary team service to manage patients with active lower limb pathologies due to a variety of medical presentations.

The Ryde Hospital podiatry service provides assessment, diagnosis, treatment, and recommendations for the management of lower limb pathology with the goals of:

• Prevention of lower limb complications
• Optimising care of complex lower limb disorders
• Preventing admissions/ re-admission
• Limb salvage

The primary role of a podiatrist within acute hospital setting includes: skin integrity, infection management, pressure injury management and falls prevention inclusive of pressure offloading.

The service provides care in a range of settings, these include acute inpatient settings, outpatient services and a sub-acute rehabilitation setting at the Graythwaite Rehabilitation Centre.

The Ryde Hospital podiatry department works closely with the Royal North Shore Hospital high risk foot service to co-manage patients. All referrals sent to Ryde will be triaged against a pre-set criteria based on the clinical severity for the referral reason rather than the patients residential suburb.

Services provided by the Ryde Podiatry Out-patient Clinic

• Advanced vascular and neurological lower limb assessment
• Assessment and management of low to moderate risk foot and lower leg wounds
• Assessment of osteomyelitis in the foot (with referral onto RNSH HRFS)
• Pressure Injury foot or ankle assessment and management
• Management of in-active ‘cold’ neuropathic fracture, i.e ‘charcot neuro-arthropathy’
• Assessment, prescription, and application of compression devices
• Footwear assessment and prescription of:
  • Custom made footwear (including liaison with external funding bodies)
  • Medical grade off the shelf footwear
• Fitting of offloading devices (foot orthotics, wound care shoes and CAM walker)

• Any recent X-Rays of your lower limb
• Any recent pathology results
• Frequently worn footwear

The Ryde Hospital podiatry services accepts referrals for any of the following:

• Active foot/leg ulceration and/or managed Infection
• Active or suspected neuropathic fracture (charcot neuro-arthropathy)

 
Please note depending on the severity of the presentation the patient may be referred to the Royal North Shore Hospital high risk foot service.
 

• Referral into the Ryde podiatry department is via a general medical practitioner or in-patient unit discharge summary.
• Nursing staff and allied health professionals who wish to refer patients must attach a medical practitioner referral letter alongside theirs.
• Referrals for patients residing outside the Royal North Shore/Ryde catchment will be directed to their local service following referral triage. The patient will be contacted to advise them of their local service and a letter will be sent back to the GP outlining this.
• Once triaged and care has been accepted the patient will be contacted by the Ryde Hospital podiatry administration officer and offered an appointment

 
For advice regarding referrals, including referral expedition in patients where there is high clinical concern, contact the service on (02) 9858 7161

Referrals to the Ryde podiatry out-patient clinic
 

•  All new patients referred to the service will receive a thorough assessment and have an individualised treatment and management plan developed.
• If following the initial review, the podiatrist deems that there is requirement for specialist review (high risk foot service, orthopaedic fracture clinic or vascular clinic), the patient will be allocated to the specific clinic within the ambulatory care centre at Royal North Shore Hospital to be co-managed with the required team.

 
Referrals should include:
 
Patient details: Name, date of birth, address and contact phone number, requirement for an interpreter
 
Clinical detail: Reason for referral, treatment to date, medical history, current medications, allergies
 
Discharge summary referrals: If referring directly from an inpatient setting, it is advised that the requirement for a Podiatry Service follow up is documented in the discharge summary and this is faxed through to the Ryde Podiatry Service on 9858 7366
 
Please attach results of any investigations to the referral. This will help avoid unnecessary duplication of tests, additional appointments and delays.
 
Referrals with insufficient information will be returned to the GP until further information is provided to the service

Referrals contact

Email: NSLHD-RydeHospitalPodiatryService@health.nsw.gov.au

Fax: 02 9858 7366

Can transport be organised for people to attend?

Ryde podiatry department does not offer a transport service.

Is there a cost to patients to attend the clinic?

There is no cost to attend the Ryde podiatry department.

Additional information:

Podiatry services are provided on an ongoing basis to patients with an identified clinical need. All patients will be assessed against clinical risk factors for foot pathology.

People found to have no active risk factors will be discharged to community providers of foot care.