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gangrene advise for caring for my husband needed please

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belinda legate

belinda legate

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Relationship to Diabetes
My hubby has been Type 2 for over 15 yrs now, He became ill with foot and leg pain, I noticed something on his big toe, After scans and hospital visits over the last two months he now has dry gangrene, The one problem is that no-one has advised us on how to care for this foot, I must say that trying to get the dose of painkiller right has not been easy but we seem to have got it right now,No-one is willing to say how long this can go on for or what to except along the way or what care i need to give daily, I would be very grateful of any advise, many thanks
 
Hi Belinda, welcome to the forum 🙂 Very sorry to hear about the problems your husband is having :( What action is being taken - when will he next see his GP or specialist? If he's not being seen by a specialist foot clinic, then ask his GP for a referral immediately, they should be able to advise you about the best way to car for the problem. How are his blood sugar levels? Keeping these as close to 'in range' as possible should help with recovery. What medication is he on for his diabetes? Sorry for all the questions!

Diabetes UK's Careline should be able to advise you on the best sources of help - details are here:

https://www.diabetes.org.uk/How_we_help/Careline/

Care can be so variable up and down the country, unfortunately :( I hope that you can find the professional care you need, and that a full recovery is not too far away - please let us know how things go.
 
Hi there, Thank you for the link. My husband is being treated at Southampton Hospital which is a worry, His diabetes is treated with Metformin but the list of other meds are massive, Treated by our GP for foot pain for some 18mths he was sent to Winchester hospital for a CT scan in May, Seeing the specialist at a follow up appointment which lasted maybe 5 mins we were told " there is nothing i can do for you you have blockages in both legs and it is too risky i wont touch you until we need to amputate, good bye", Then is Oct he had pain in his shin another hospital trip to Winchester and they gave him Morphine no test done and sent him home, Two weeks later and his pain was worst, back to Winchester who sent us to Southampton, another CT scan done and he was found to have a DVT in his calf, put on blood thinners and pain killer and back home in 48 hours, One week later i spotted a tiny black patch on the big toe so back to the GP who made a emergency app 3 days later back at Southampton, Hubby was then found to have another clot behind his knee, We have just been told to go home let it run it's course and given yet more meds and told he could loose a couple of toes or the leg below the knee in the end, with no advise on care or how long running the course could be? months or years? We have another Southampton appointment on Thursday and i really need a list of thing to ask? many thanks
 
Sorry i should also have added that 3/4 of his big toe is now Black he did have a infection which has healed and gone, We now have his meds correct so he feels very little pain but can function which he had been unable to do due to too higher dose of Morphine which made him very ill
 
Dear god! I'd get in touch with the Careline as Northerner suggests as soon as possible. Also, you might try the Patient Advice Liaison service (PALs) who may also be able to help. Please let us know how it goes.
 
Thank you Alison i will first thing in the morning, It would seem that we live in the worst part of the country and getting treatment at the worst Hospital too, I know of a chap the same age as my husband 57yrs old and he has been sat for over 2 yrs waiting for toes to drop off of their own accord and one by one as they are nearly off the hospital removes them under Local and send him home to wait for the next time, again no advise given on care, It's such a worry
 
This sounds dreadful Belinda, I'm so sorry to hear what you have both been through, and still are :( I'm also in Southampton. Have you spoken to the diabetes team at Southmpton General at all? This is precisely the sort of thing they have been promising to get on top of, but it seems people are still slipping beyond what I would view as even adequate care. Is he registered with the Southampton Podiatry services? You can self-refer to this service (I was advised to do this shortly after diagnosis) - details here: http://www.solent.nhs.uk/service-info.asp?id=147&utype=1

I'm shocked by the attitudes of some of the people you have had to deal with :(
 
We live in Andover, can we use the Podiatry Service in Southampton? No -one told us there was a Diabetes team there, I will be on the case in the Morning, thank you so much for this advise
 
My toe went black and I was in a lot of pain with it. I ended up in A&E and eventually lost three toes, so please do make sure hubby gets some help quick. Once the gangrene is sorted out he will feel a lot better.
 
belinda legate said:
We live in Andover, can we use the Podiatry Service in Southampton? No -one told us there was a Diabetes team there, I will be on the case in the Morning, thank you so much for this advise
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I'm not sure Belinda, it's worth giving them a call and if not then ask if there is an equivalent service in your area. Let us know how you get on, and good luck 🙂
 
Caroline hubby is a big softy push over but i'm not, It's like beating my head on the wall but i do chip away at things, sometimes i've had to take him to the GP 3 days on the trot before somethings been done, But i have been given more advise on here in one afternoon than all the hospital trips and i am so grateful, Do you mind me asking how long it took to sort your problem out as no-one is telling us anything? i know no two people are the same
Northerner thank you so much, i will update the post when i have more news
 
belinda legate said:
Caroline hubby is a big softy push over but i'm not, It's like beating my head on the wall but i do chip away at things, sometimes i've had to take him to the GP 3 days on the trot before somethings been done, But i have been given more advise on here in one afternoon than all the hospital trips and i am so grateful, Do you mind me asking how long it took to sort your problem out as no-one is telling us anything? i know no two people are the same
Northerner thank you so much, i will update the post when i have more news
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I first went to A&E on July 31st (date remembered as it was the day after big boys birthday)after trying to get to the doctors for what felt like ages. Once in hospital the first toe was taken away and by the end of September I'd lost 3 toes. All the infection has gone now and I get the district nurse in twice a week to change dressings. I had 4 more visits as an in patient and in total 5 ops, but my foot and everything else feels so much better. Because it is the foot and because of the diabetes the healing takes longer anyway, but the foot is healing. For me on a plus note my diabetes care is now under the hospital, and I am no longer on Metformin which through my stomach out big time. It can be a bit scary to start off with if you don't know what will happen but worth it in the end
 
Thank you so much for sharing that Caroline, I have just read it to my husband and at least he now has a understanding of what can happen and he feels alot better about it now, i will post a update as soon as i know more, many thanks
 
Hi there, Just to let you know that you can no longer self ref to the Podiatry Service in Southampton, This ended about 6 mths ago, i rang them today and was told i needed our GP to do it, I also rang Careline who were a great help and gave lots of sound advise, I now know just what to ask at out appointment on Thursday to find out everything we need to know, thank you
 
belinda legate said:
Hi there, Just to let you know that you can no longer self ref to the Podiatry Service in Southampton, This ended about 6 mths ago, i rang them today and was told i needed our GP to do it, I also rang Careline who were a great help and gave lots of sound advise, I now know just what to ask at out appointment on Thursday to find out everything we need to know, thank you
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Glad to hear Careline could help you out 🙂 I've noticed quite a few 'efficiency savings' in the podiatry service in recent years, I guess the self-referral is one of them :(

I hope the appointment goes well - let us know how you and hubby get on 🙂
 
Hi there, just to let you know our appointment went very well today, We went to a Mr Morris's clinic, we had more info in 10 mins from this man than any other doctor,First thing he said was that he had heard about Mr Legate a number of times and it was about time he got involved himself, Where other doctors were only interested in the "black toe" he was interested in the "massive clot" just below the knee, He is putting my husband forward for a bypass op at a meeting in the morning, he will ring us tomorrow with a view of doing the op next week, fingers crossed, i will let you know how we get on
 
Oh good, something's happening at last, I'm so glad. Let us know how it goes.
 
Excellent news Belinda! Really pleased to hear this! 🙂 I hope everything goes well for you both 🙂
 
Hubby went into hospital yesterday, he was going to have a exploratory op, but it was canceled until tuesday,
 
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