Emma was born October 18, 1999 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, with severe bilateral clubfeet. We were of course very upset on a day that was supposed to have been so happy. An orthopedist was called in and Emma was casted within hours of birth. He explained that she would have to go through a series of casts till she was six months old, then extensive joint and ligament surgery, followed by another 6 months of casts, and likely another operation at around 2 years old. He did say that her feet, while severe, did have a good amount of malleability, and while she would never be a ballerina she would certainly be able to walk. We were comforted that there would be a positive outcome, we would simply have to get through it. Emma wouldn't remember any of the discomfort, only we would. But I cried over the thought "but what if she WANTS to be a ballerina?" (I was quite hormonal at the time).

I was a member of a pregnancy board at parentsplace.com at the time, and that website being the wonderful resource it is, also had a club foot board which I immediately went to once out of the hospital. I read about another method of treating club feet which sounded promising- almost too good to be true- the Ponseti Method. Martin Egbert was one of the people who responded to our plea for help. There seemed to be an amicable split between the "Ponseti people" and the "surgery people". One surgery person recommended that we make a decision about treatment and stick to it, and not to let the length of time of treatment sway us. This hit home because we were leaning away from surgery because of the very long time Emma would have to be in casts. On the other hand, the Ponseti method actually takes years with the Dennis Brown bar.

We talked to our orthopedist about our dilemma. He said he hadn't heard of Dr. Ponseti, and that we should beware of doctors on the internet- especially those in the States- they're all out to make money. He emphasized that it was important that the doctor be published and fully peer reviewed. We said that Dr. Ponseti was published and we could get his articles for him, but he wasn't interested. So we wrote to Dr. Ponseti explaining our problem. He wrote back saying that the treatment Emma was receiving would result in painful feet later on, that surgery was not necessary, and that we should go to see him as soon as possible. This actually (and perversely in retrospect) served to make us decide on the surgery. Here we were at a world renowned hospital (the Shriner's) and (with all apologies to Dr. Ponseti) Dr. Ponseti seemed to be depicting a worse case scenario of surgery without ever seeing her feet. We stayed with the Shriner's and continued getting casts done. In January we read once again about the Ponseti method and how doctors who previously performed surgeries were now being converted to this method and would never go back. We were once more uncertain of our choice. We spoke several times with a "converted" doctor- Dr. Herzenberg in Baltimore (the closest Ponseti practitioner to us). We also wrote Dr. Ponseti again and spoke to him on the phone. This time we were more serious about it. We considered flying to Iowa. We spoke with another doctor at the Shriner's, he said he did know of Dr. Ponseti, that he has done alot for club foot correction over many years. We asked this doctor to look at the Ponseti articles we had and he said "I don't have to- I've read everything". We decided that we had nothing to lose except some money. Even if the Ponseti method didn't work, we could still go for the surgery later on. We bought our tickets.

We loved our Iowa experience! Dr. Ponseti was so nice, and so good with Emma too. She had 3 sets of plaster casts over 15 days and we couldn't believe the improvement after just the first set! She then had a heel cord tenotomy on both feet, followed by casts that were kept on for 3 weeks. She's now in the bar 23 hours a day and seems to have fully adjusted to it (after 2 days of difficulty). Her feet look good, even though they are currently over-corrected.

Dan and I would both strongly recommend to any parent to try the Ponseti method before resigning their child to surgery that may not be needed. It does no harm to try it but could make a world of difference to the child, especially in the later years of life. Thank you so much Dr. Ponseti!

Lisa & Dan & Emma.

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