By Radhika Bhirani, IANS
New Delhi : Sangita Khanna, a 52-year-old woman, suffers from diabetes. She is apprehensive about treating herself to a pedicure in a parlour – and rightly so.
A badly handled pedicure – leading to cuts on the feet or minor burns from prolonged exposure to hot water – can cause bacterial infections and non-healing ulcers in diabetic patients as wounds take longer to heal in diabetic patients. Due to loss of sensation in their feet, diabetics often don’t come to know about such injury early enough.
Unfortunately in India, beauticians as well as diabetics themselves are mostly unaware of such threats.
After speaking to 10 premier beauty parlours in the city, IANS found that only four took special care in doing pedicures for diabetic men and women.
Banita Verma, who heads the Gurgaon branch of VLCC, a recognised healthcare centre, said: “Our clients don’t tell us if they are diabetic or not and we never ask them. But in case they are bruised or have any specific foot-related problem, we ensure utmost care in doing the pedicure safely.”
Nilisha Mehta, manager of the Lakme Beauty Salon, said its pedicurists are especially trained to refrain from massaging inappropriate pressure points for diabetics as well as heart patients and take all precautionary measures required for the safety of diabetic patients.
In India almost 40,000 legs are amputated every year due to diabetes alone, says Ashok Jhingan, diabetologist and chairman of the Delhi Diabetes Research Centre. Ignorance, he says, is the major cause.
“Feet and vision are the worst-affected body parts of a diabetic. Due to a gradual decrease in vision, patients tend to wound themselves. And due to a simultaneous loss of sensation in the feet, they do not feel the pain and hence the wound is ignored, causing a prolonged infection,” Jhingan said.
Anoop Misra, director and head of the department of diabetes and metabolism at the Fortis Group of Hospitals in Delhi, said: “Beauticians don’t have a clue to the adverse effects that pedicures can have on a diabetic patient. They use non-sterilised equipment, which can be a source of infection.”
But who is to be blamed for this ignorance?
“Doctors can be blamed. We are usually able to devote only 10 minutes per patient, in which case we can’t possibly diagnose, medicate and also educate them about foot care,” Misra said.
Misra revealed that according to preliminary data collected for an ongoing “foot care” awareness research, almost 80 percent of diabetic women in Delhi lack basic knowledge about the importance of foot care.
Some experts are trying to generate awareness about the cause.
Meena Chhabbra, a diabetologist, who runs a private clinic in the capital, distributes pamphlets and brochures packed with information about diabetic healthcare, including foot care, to her patients.
Explaining how pedicures cause infections, she said: “In a beauty parlour, limited equipment often compels their repeated use for every other customer, irrespective of the hazards of this practice.
“This can result in bacterial infections, non-healing ulcers and in extreme cases, gangrene which may lead to the amputation of the leg.”
For those diabetic men and women, who still want to make their feet look nice, Jhingan suggests: “Even if afflicted people want a pedicure, they should be cautious about hygiene and ideally carry their own nail cutter, filer etc, besides visiting a professional or podiatrist only for the purpose”