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Local Living
A community podcast for Palm Beach to Parkland.
Local Living
Dr. Mikhail Burakovskiy: Revolutionizing Foot and Ankle Care with Experience and Cutting-Edge Technology
Join us as we sit down with Dr. Mikhail Burakovskiy, known as Dr. B, the visionary founder of One Stop Foot and Ankle Care in Boynton Beach. Dr. B reveals how groundbreaking treatments like the MLS Robotic Laser and Softwave TRT technology are revolutionizing foot and ankle care, providing rapid relief and reducing the need for invasive procedures. You'll hear of patients whose lives have been transformed, walking out of his clinic without the aids they once relied on.
In our conversation, Dr. B shares his inspiring journey from Ukraine, to Seattle, to Florida. Whether you're dealing with a chronic condition or curious about the latest in Podiatric care, this episode is packed with valuable information and a story of success.
www.onestopfootandanklecare.com
561-778-2100
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Welcome, welcome everyone to Local Living. We are a community podcast from Palm Beach to Parkland. I'm David Conway, your host for today's episode, and with us we have Dr Mikhail Burakovsky. I'm only going to say that once. Doctor, Welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:David and Dr Burakovsky I lied, Dr B, as his patients call him, is actually the founder of One Stop Foot and Ankle Care in Boynton Beach. And, doctor, I'm really glad you're with us today. Why don't you start by telling our listeners a little bit more about One Stop Foot and Ankle Care?
Speaker 2:Well, thank you, david, for inviting me. I'm excited to be here and I'm excited to talk about One Stop Foot and Ankle Care, because we are the only podiatry clinic in the United States offering services that we have. You know, I always, you know, I've been practicing for nearly 20 years and I practiced first in Seattle for 17 years and only a couple months ago I opened the practice here and made the services available to South Florida, to Boynton Beach specifically, and we have a lot of interesting products that we us to heal acute or chronic injuries or acute or chronic pain that we see in our patients. On top of it, we have MLS robotic laser. We actually have this laser is first and the only at this point.
Speaker 2:I'm sure there will be some more robotic lasers in Florida. This is a new generation robotic MLS laser, so it's kind of fun to see those both devices at work on patients, where we have patients walk in with a cane and walk out without so, which is amazing. I mean, that's really what steers up a passion to this profession, where I can see things change in front of my eyes. It's not, you know, we don't have to wait for a month for the therapy to work. It's something that works instantly.
Speaker 1:So when you say a patient walks in with a cane and I'm sure this doesn't happen always but are you saying after several treatments they don't need the cane or they walk out without the cane, or are you literally saying they walk in with the cane and they could possibly walk out without the cane?
Speaker 2:David, it's that amazing. I mean we have it's not every time. I mean, listen, there's a human body is very complex and we can't fix everything. But I've seen it where we had patients walk in you know they walk up in the morning, let's say and they could not step on their foot, they couldn't step on their heel, or they had injury, they sprained their ankle and they went to emergency room and you know they couldn't step on their heel. Or they had injury, they sprained their ankle and they went to emergency room and you know they found there's no fracture, there's a sprain, and normally what do we do?
Speaker 2:We tell patients rise, rest, ice and elevate while it heals and they limp around. And here we go. They come to my office and we perform this dual treatment where I utilize the softwave TRT technology and MLS laser and patients walk out without a cane. And again, I like how you focused on that. That it will not work for every patient and some patients do require more extensive treatment or possibly surgery, but having this option where I don't have to give a patient a cortisone shot or I don't have to schedule them right away for surgery to fix a partially torn ligament and having the technology that can help with that. Hey, welcome to 21st century.
Speaker 1:So is it just me? Welcome to 21st century. So is it just me? When I was younger, I broke my ankle once, and then I sprained the other ankle at a later date. Now the sprain, for whatever reason, was much more painful than the break.
Speaker 2:Is that unique? Was it just me, or is that common? No, it's extremely common. Sometimes a soft tissue injury or sprain, strain of tendons and ligaments could take way longer to heal than a broken bone and, as a matter of fact, sometimes those ligaments they just don't heal at all on their own. You know, once you tear them, the best case scenario they'll scar in, and then you have scars and you have friction, you have stiffness in the ankle or foot and you know, and then you have to have surgery. Surgery is great. I love doing surgeries, but there's a big but there's a lot of risks involved with surgery. And when we cut into a patient to fix one problem, a lot of times we create other issues. So we patients develop scar tissue after surgeries or we interrupt nerves or vasculature. Now, on the opposite end, now we have this new technology that not only it helps to alleviate pain, decrease inflammation, it actually stimulates your own body, without traumatizing it, to start the healing process right away.
Speaker 1:So you're a surgeon. Would you say this new technology? Are you doing less surgeries than you may have done before? Does it actually help someone avoid surgery? Correct, and how did you get into the business? So how does one choose to be a foot doctor? Was there an inspiration? Can you share that with us?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm one of those that always wanted to be in medicine. I mean, I remember back in Ukraine when I was eight years old, we had family toys that were passed from generation to generation, this beautiful soft toy tiger that my grandparents cherished and told us stories how they inherited from their grandparents. Well, little me, at eight years old, I took some suture material from my grandfather, who was a dentist, and I opened the tiger up and I sutured it back together and I brought it into a family dinner and said here, look how nice I can suture. So yeah, it started way back then, you know, from suturing little soft toys and then when I was 14, I was already volunteering at hospitals in Ukraine, just kind of trying to learn and see where it would lead me. I was heavily involved with different sports at the time and I was just fascinated by biomechanics. I was fascinated by the function of foot and ankle joint.
Speaker 2:And in 92, we immigrated from Ukraine to Seattle Washington and that's kind of where I really began my career in medicine. I started my pre-med undergraduate training right away. I got a job without speaking any English in the hospital, which was fun. You know I feel sorry for nurses that had to explain to me how to do things. But somehow I made it through and you know, I got my undergrad in biology from Seattle Pacific and got into podiatry school in New York and four years of school there and then three years of surgical training and here I am, boynton Beach of Florida.
Speaker 1:So I've got to ask you said zero English. Are you exaggerating a little bit? How do you get through a job interview speaking zero English? Do you just show them your resume and say this is me. What do you do?
Speaker 2:So it was interesting stories. Well, I learned some phrases so I could get by through some conversation of very basic English, where my name is this and you know. So at that time they really needed a nursing assistance and I was really eager to get that job. So I got a job. They, they, and they said well, you have to go through this couple months of training to become a CNA, and I was playing sports and I broke my arm.
Speaker 2:And I come to a first day of actually work with a broken arm and a cast on my arm and they go well, you can't be here, this is liability, you can't. I said listen, I can do with my arm, with one arm. Good, I can do better job than most of your people here. They go oh, come on, we can't, we just cannot legally allow you to do this. So I got down on the floor and gave them 30 push-ups on one hand and they said okay, we'll give you an exception, you don't touch patients while you're healing, but we'll allow you to study. So I think they like my drive, they like my ambitions, my hard work, and they close their eyes on my ability or my English skills.
Speaker 1:So I did a little reading of your bio and you've had quite a career and I know that you don't only work on athletes, but I read that you've actually worked with some Olympic athletes. Is that correct?
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 2:So when I was in Seattle I was closely involved with different sports teams.
Speaker 2:I was doing a lot of the community work where I worked with just even high school volleyball teams, with soccer teams, and then I got involved with skating teams and I got invited to US skating tournament and I was in a team of doctors where we treated injured athletes, we prepped them for the actual tournament, we taught them how to warm up, how to do certain things, and then when athletes would get injured, we would drive them actually into my office where I had diagnostic ultrasound and we could give them ultrasound guided injections to get them back on the ice osteo-ultrasound and we could give them ultrasound-guided injections to get them back on the ice.
Speaker 2:You know, treating athletes, professional athletes, is a little different than us weekend warriors, it's. You know they need to be back in the field now, not tomorrow. Now. So it's hard, it's damaging and there's a lot of ethical component here where you have to weigh out and you have to tell them at certain point that listen, if you do this, you will need a surgery. And most of them, you know, they turn around and say I don't care, get me to ice, let me do my job let me perform. I've been trained for this for months, years, and that's what you have to do.
Speaker 1:So when does somebody call you? How much pain do I need to be in? When do I know I have a problem that really needs to be looked at by a doctor?
Speaker 2:So pain is good. When we don't have pain, we're in trouble. But pain is how our body talks to us. So when you feel pain, you need to contact a doctor right away. So we need to find out pain is just a symptom, so there's something else is going on that's leading to that pain. There's a cause of it, and that's what I love in my field, where I can do a little detective work. I can track down to the cause of it and then we treat not only the symptom. We don't treat just pain, which we do, you know we'll make you feel better right away, but then we address the cause of it and prevention is the key really. So if you feel pain, you got to call right away, and a lot of times I can save you a trip to emergency room.
Speaker 1:So any myths or misconceptions about podiatry in general that you find when you have patients come in Is that what it is? Is pain is good or whatever you found?
Speaker 2:Well, pain is good in terms that it's your signal to address the problem. It's only in those terms, I mean. But you don't have to live with pain. You know it's not your friend, it's not. It's just an alarm in your body that you were born with. You're lucky to have it. Some people, unfortunately genetically or because of certain diseases like diabetes, or they have peripheral neuropathy they don't have pain and that's why they develop ulcers, that's why they develop gangrene and other issues. So people that are more or less healthy that do have pain. This is your alarm. This is that red or yellow light at a certain point that tells you it's time to call a doctor, give us a call, or give whoever is near you a call who can take care of the cause of that problem. So chronic pain is extremely not good. It needs to be treated and it can be treated if addressed appropriately. You don't have to live with pain. That's the bottom line.
Speaker 1:So you had a long career in Seattle and now you're in Boynton Beach, Florida. What brought you all the way over here?
Speaker 2:Well, many things. First, our daughter is kind of following in my footsteps. She's getting into physical therapy. She was state champion, state dance champion and she wanted to help people through the move therapy. So she's getting into physical therapy. She wants to be a doctor of physical therapy and that's what she's studying right now at University of Central Florida in Orlando. My family have already moved to sunny Florida. They live in Sunny Isles, ventura, boynton Beach. So we wanted to find an optimal location for us where we're close to our daughter and yet we're close to our family as well, and Boynton Beach just felt just right. You know, it's just. We love people here, we love the community spirit and we want the sunshine. You know, we lived in Seattle for too long and that beautiful round, yellow thing that's on the sky that we didn't see much in Seattle. We love it. We want to experience it here.
Speaker 1:And are you still a weekend warrior? You're still doing one-armed push-ups, doctor.
Speaker 2:Well, I'm trying to be regular now. I'm trying to stay active. I mean, I love all the sports. I play tennis in seattle now I'm exploring, uh, pickleball and getting more and more involved with that. I love it and, um, unfortunately it's I see a lot of injuries with that. So I'm looking into already some local teams how I can help them to prevent those injuries and, if injuries do happen, to heal them pretty quick.
Speaker 1:Now you've had quite a career. Was there a time when things might have been a little tougher, that you might have gone through a hardship or some sort of challenge that you can call upon today to help you be more effective in what you do?
Speaker 2:You know, there are always challenges. Every day we face these different kind of challenges and I love it. I get bored when there are no challenges and, like I told my wife, you'll never be bored with me because I always look for those challenges. Some of those challenges are great. Some of them I wish I've never looked for them. So you know, what really makes my day is. You know, you can have a very challenging day, very difficult patients, and then you get that one patient that walks into your door with very sour expression, with a lot of pain, and then they walk out and they have a smile and you made their day, you changed their life, you affected the quality of their life and this is what keeps me going, this is what excites me.
Speaker 1:Some people they just exist with the pain. Isn't that right, doctor, when really a call to you, for example, could change their entire life?
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and I always tell them that when you come to see me, your healing starts from. This is your day one in healing and I'm not a magician. And I work with physical therapists, I work with the primary care providers, with orthopedics. It's always a team approach, it's a holistic approach we have. You know I learn everything about my patients and you know doing all that helps me to understand how to optimize their quality of life and I want to be part of it. I want to keep them going and allow them to do what they want to do with their life.
Speaker 1:You know, doctor, it seems that one-stop foot and ankle care and you specifically, you combined a long story, very successful career with the most modern technology available.
Speaker 2:Yes, we have, and you forgot to mention that. We have the greatest antifungal laser technology, which is really cool, and we use two different lasers to treat fungus and that's so common everywhere in the United States, in Seattle and Florida. And then we have another technology that I'm really excited about is a microwave technology that not only it kills the plant of wart, it actually activates your immune system. So that way, most likely, you will never get it again, because these I mean warts I've treated for years in kids and teenagers and even adults, and they can be really stubborn and sometimes they keep coming back. With this new technology, just two, three treatments and we're done, and a lot of times in the past where we treated warts, there is a downtime where people develop blisters. They have a lot of pain, this treatment, there's no downtime. They feel a little discomfort or some discomfort during the treatment, but afterwards there's just no downtime, which is great.
Speaker 1:So please share with our listeners where is the practice located?
Speaker 2:So we are right in the heart of Boynton Beach, we are on Congress Avenue and with intersection with the Gateway. So if anyone knows this great restaurant, the Lemongrass Bistro, we're on the third floor there. So a lot of people call. When they call us, they ask where are you guys located? Well, do you know Lemongrass Asian Bistro? We're right on top of it, on the third floor.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, Sounds like easy access for those that live in some of the Western communities, but also you're real close to I-95, where someone's coming from Delray or Boca or West Palm easy to get to you? And what's the best way to contact you, Dr?
Speaker 2:B, so you can always call us on the phone, which is 561-778-2100, or our website. I highly encourage our patients to follow us either on Instagram or on our website, which is a onestopfootandanklecarecom and website. On Instagram, you can just put in onestopfootand in Uncle Karen. We should come up. I blog every single day. I put in videos, educational videos, and this is my outreach to the community, where I can teach everyone for free on how to take care of certain things without actually coming in to see me. I might save you a trip. So follow us on our website and our Instagram and you might learn some things, and if you do have an issue, I would love to see you and see what I can do to help.
Speaker 1:Dr B, it has been a real pleasure to have you today. Thanks for joining us on Local Living.
Speaker 2:My pleasure, David, and it's always good talking to you.
Speaker 1:Likewise and to our listeners, thank you for joining us on Local Living. Once again, I'm David Conway and look forward to having you back real soon.