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The Walnut Hills therapy team worked with representatives from Hanger
Prosthetics & Orthotics to get John Dickerson back on his feet.
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The teamwork and tenacity of RehabCare staff at the Walnut Hills Convalescent Center in Austin, TX have literally put a homeless man back on his feet.
Once wheelchair bound, John Dickerson now can be seen walking the halls at Walnut Hills aided by a prosthesis on his right leg, an orthotic insert and special shoe on his left leg and a walker for balance.
Dickerson, who suffered from alcoholism and lived on the streets, arrived at Walnut Hills last year during an exceptionally cold winter in Austin. About a month shy of his 55th birthday, frostbite took his right leg below the knee and half of his left foot.
Thanks to Medicaid, he was eligible for a bed at Walnut Hills and rehabilitative therapy in the RehabCare department. But because he was ineligible for Medicare and therefore funding for a prosthesis, his rehab therapy centered on preparing him for life in a wheelchair.
During this twice-weekly therapy, which was extended slightly beyond two months thanks to an appeal to Medicaid by RehabCare team members, RehabCare Program Director Laura Sullivan and therapists treating Dickerson became concerned that he was unfairly being sentenced to a life in a wheelchair.
“He stood out because as he healed from his surgery he became stronger and did everything we asked of him, and he had a desire to walk,” Sullivan says.
“There also was the unfairness that someone who was just turning 55 might end up wheelchair bound in a nursing home for the rest of his life, never walking again because insurance wouldn’t provide him with a prosthesis.”
Dickerson’s brother and other family members came forward to support him but were unable to outright afford the cost of a prosthesis, which cost in the neighborhood of $5,000. They also attempted to get him into an independent-living program but that did not work out.
After determining that Dickerson’s options for getting a prosthesis were otherwise exhausted, in January 2008 Sullivan approached Hanger Prosthetics and Orthotics, a prosthetic provider with which her unit closely works, to see if they would provide a prosthesis.
“They came through and built one for him,” she says, adding that the company covered most of the $5,000, with Dickerson’s family picking up a small balance. At the same time, RehabCare obtained approval from the state for eight rehab sessions to train Dickerson to use his new leg.
Following the arrival of his prosthesis in February, physical therapist Pancy Chung and physical therapist assistant Lillie Miller-Walker taught Dickerson how to put on the leg and take it off, also showing nurses in the nursing home how to do it, and taught him to walk on the prosthesis with the aid of a walker.
Although he likely will always need the walker, Chung says, “He’s very high level and very strong, and a walker is easy to manipulate, so it’s actually not hard for him to use.”
When confined to a wheelchair, Dickerson “tended to stay in bed, but now the prosthesis has brought him out into the community where he frequently is seen walking the halls,” Chung says.
Sullivan says Dickerson’s brother still is trying to acquire alternative living arrangements for Dickerson, either in a community-based program or perhaps his home. In the meantime, Dickerson’s quality of life certainly is considerably better than when he arrived at Walnut Hills, and Sullivan is proud of the role her team played in that transformation.
“That’s what was so neat, that we recognized this guy had the potential and we went the extra mile to do what was necessary to get him on his feet and walking,” she says.
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