John Papa

For over twenty years I suffered from a foot condition with flare ups, causing severe swelling and huge pain to my right foot. Family doctors were all suspecting either small fracture or gout condition. However x-rays, MRIs and lab reports all were always normal. As a traveling IT executive, I spent many painful days walking and boarding airplanes with this extremely painful condition. And as luck would have, it my flare ups always occurred at the most opportune business time. I also visited many away from home 24 hour patient care facilities, where again, I mostly would be given pain pills and sent on my way.

The undiagnosed condition affected my exercise and daily life regime. Painful walking, no running, some biking and man can I remember all those years of squeezing my painful/swollen foot into a ski booth while on a scheduled ski vacation. It really made for a very uncomfortable vacation experience. And this happened almost every year after year.

Then after hearing about HSS from friends and newspapers about your number 1 rating in orthopedics and number 3 rating in rheumatology, I decided to schedule visits for both orthopedic and rheumatology evaluations. Both Drs. Roberts and Magid communicated together on my situation and after an in house aspirations procedure, x-ray/MRI reviews and lab work, my condition was diagnosed as atypical gout.

Given that, Dr. Magid, who was HSS's IT chief at the time so we had a lot in common to discuss, sent me on a few weeks and months of selected medications which would ultimately control my atypical gout situation.

And I can say that I have been flare-up free since my last visit, which is now over 6+ years ago. I can not thank HSS, Dr. Magid and Dr. Roberts enough for their expertise and concern. They were both wonderful to work with and can highly recommend them.

Oh, and today, I run 30 miles a week doing 5K's, 10k's, 15k's and bike riding. In 2013, I won a medal in my age group at the Jersey Man Triathlon event for running and biking. Awesome!