Fortuna Amedeo

First of all, let me start by saying that I’m a professional dancer, so I’m very picky about the care of my feet, since they are how I make my living. I went to another podiatrist in Philadelphia who cares for the ballerinas of the Pennsylvania Ballet, thinking that would be the best way to go, since I was having chronic toe pain. That doctor told me I had an ingrown, and proceeded to hack away my toenail without much anesthesia. I figured I should trust him, and gritted my teeth through the pain.
Growing out the toenail was painful, but I waited 3 – 4 months until that part grew back, but the toe was still hurting, so I went back, and he said that he needed to take back more of the nail (I had almost passed out the time before from the pain, so I was not very excited about this. He started cutting away at the toenail again, and said that he was not sure what was going on, but that he would have to remove MORE of the nail than last time to get at what was underneath. At this point, I asked if maybe something else could be done, he said he would take a picture of my toe (by this point, he had called in his interns and everyone had a turn oogling my toe as well as taking a photo of it on his iPhone to send to a dermatologist). They said they would get back to me — they never did.
Anyway, skip ahead a bit — I decided to see a dermatologist on my own, who said it was definitely not an ingrown, and it was actually a tumor under my toenail. He recommended me to a podiatric surgeon. Luckily, I found Dr. Fortuna, who has worked on some of the other professionals in the area.
Even from the first visit, he was amazing! He has a great, no nonsense way of conveying information and was able to tell me immediately what was wrong with my toe (again, not an ingrown, or even a bone spur as the previous doctor had diagnosed) since he had the foresight to X-​ray my foot from different angles and not just from the top and side.
He recommended surgery and did a great job describing what the surgery was going to entail, and what to expect after. He was very kind and was able to answer all of my questions about the procedure.
The day of the procedure, he was able to numb my toe before he did the numbing injection (I’m afraid of needles) which really made the whole numbing the toe thing a lot more bearable. The entire procedure only lasted probably 15 minutes, and he even (per my request) was able to show me the tumor that he took out of my toe!
I had the procedure on Monday and on Wednesday, I was feeling a bit antsy, because my toe was hurting (well, I did just have surgery on it 48 hours earlier, so duh), so I called into the office and he was able to see me to just double check on everything. He was very kind and allowed me to come in and explain why the bandage felt tight and now that I was less loopy, explain what he had done during the surgery.
I am against taking very strong painkillers, and I’m very happy that he was respectful of my wishes (I just did the antibiotics and advil) and was able to numb my toe again to respect my wishes for not taking any oxy.
I’m very happy with my procedure so far, and I go in again on Friday to have him unwrap the bandages and take a look to see how it is healing.
I was having a lot of anxiety about the toe surgery and finding the right doctor to do it, but I’m so glad that I found Dr. Fortuna!