Apollo Spectra Hospital in Alwarpet, Chennai, has launched an Advanced Super Specialty Diabetic Foot Care Clinic, bringing screening, diagnosis, wound management, vascular assessment and preventive care together under one service. The clinic is intended to help identify diabetic foot problems earlier, reduce avoidable amputations and preserve mobility.
For India’s prosthetics and orthotics community, the development is important because diabetic foot management increasingly sits at the intersection of vascular care, wound management, orthotics, footwear and amputation prevention.
The clinic includes specialist assessment of blood flow and sensation, advanced wound-care techniques, minimally invasive vascular procedures, reconstructive surgery and personalised advice on preventive foot care and appropriate footwear.
Early intervention before the foot becomes an amputation case
Diabetic foot disease can progress quickly when neuropathy reduces protective sensation and vascular disease compromises healing.
A small blister, pressure area or unnoticed injury can develop into an ulcer, infection and, in severe cases, lower-limb amputation.
Apollo Spectra says its new clinic is designed around early risk identification and limb-saving intervention, rather than waiting until a patient presents with advanced tissue breakdown.
That approach is particularly relevant to orthotists, pedorthic specialists and clinicians involved in diabetic footwear.
The earlier a high-risk foot is identified, the greater the opportunity to intervene with pressure redistribution, footwear modification, offloading and patient education before a wound develops.
Footwear becomes part of the clinical pathway
One of the most relevant elements for Bharat CPO readers is the clinic’s inclusion of specialised diabetic footwear solutions within its preventive programme.
For a patient with loss of protective sensation, footwear is not simply a comfort product.
Poorly fitting shoes, prominent seams, excessive plantar pressure or inadequate toe space can create repetitive trauma that the patient may not feel.
Appropriate diabetic footwear and insoles can therefore play an important role in redistributing pressure and protecting vulnerable areas.
For orthotists, this creates an opportunity to become more closely integrated into multidisciplinary diabetic foot teams alongside vascular surgeons, diabetologists, wound-care specialists and physiotherapists.
Advanced assessment and wound management
The Chennai clinic is offering a broad range of diagnostic and treatment services.
These include the T.I.M.E. Clinical Decision Support Tool for ulcer assessment, neurological evaluation, vascular and angiosome-based assessment, hydrosurgery-assisted debridement, Negative Pressure Wound Therapy, Topical Warm Oxygen Therapy and Platelet-Rich Plasma treatment.
Minimally invasive vascular interventions and reconstructive foot surgery are also available as part of the service.
This breadth is important because diabetic foot problems rarely result from one factor alone.
Neuropathy, vascular disease, pressure, deformity, infection and footwear can interact. Successful limb preservation therefore often depends on multiple professionals addressing different parts of the problem simultaneously.
Screening people before symptoms become severe
To accompany the clinic launch, Apollo Spectra also announced a free diabetic foot screening camp for people living with diabetes and chronic kidney disease.
The screening programme includes foot examination, blood-flow and sensation assessment and personalised preventive advice.
For CPOs, these screening programmes can be especially valuable because many patients who would benefit from orthotic intervention may not yet have entered a prosthetic or orthotic clinic.
A patient with neuropathy may continue walking normally despite developing excessive plantar pressure because pain is no longer acting as an early warning system.
By the time an ulcer becomes visible, the opportunity for simple preventive intervention may already have been missed.
A growing role for orthotics in limb preservation
The expansion of specialist diabetic foot clinics across India creates a wider opportunity for the P&O profession.
Orthotists can contribute through:
- pressure assessment and plantar-pressure redistribution;
- custom foot orthoses;
- accommodative insoles;
- diabetic and extra-depth footwear;
- offloading devices;
- Charcot foot management;
- ankle-foot orthoses where appropriate;
- postoperative protection;
- footwear review following ulcer healing.
The objective is not simply to treat an existing wound. It is to reduce the mechanical conditions that contributed to the wound developing in the first place.
That makes orthotic intervention particularly important after an ulcer has healed. Without appropriate pressure redistribution, the same area can remain vulnerable to recurrence.
From amputation treatment to amputation prevention
For many CPOs, diabetic foot disease has traditionally been encountered after the most severe outcome — when a patient is referred following a transtibial or higher-level amputation.
The development of multidisciplinary diabetic foot services provides an opportunity for the profession to move further upstream.
Rather than entering the pathway only after limb loss, orthotists can contribute at the stages of risk identification, pressure management, wound offloading and recurrence prevention.
For a healthcare system facing a large burden of diabetes, preventing even a proportion of major amputations can have significant effects on patient independence, healthcare expenditure and long-term rehabilitation requirements.
A valuable model for Indian P&O
The new Apollo Spectra clinic reinforces the increasingly important connection between diabetic foot care and prosthetics and orthotics.
Advanced wound technology and vascular procedures may attract much of the attention, but long-term limb preservation also depends on seemingly simpler interventions: checking the feet regularly, identifying pressure early, selecting appropriate footwear and ensuring the patient understands how to protect an insensate foot.
For Bharat CPO readers, that creates a clear professional opportunity.
India does not only need prosthetists capable of restoring mobility after diabetic amputation. It also needs more orthotic and footwear expertise capable of helping prevent that amputation from occurring in the first place.
- The Hindu – City hospital launches diabetic foot care clinic
- Apollo Spectra Hospitals
- International Diabetes Federation
- World Health Organization – Diabetes
- Rehabilitation Council of India