Giving Detroiters a Foot Up

As Metro Detroit enters the holiday season, many non-profit organizations and businesses are planning special events to help those in need. Assignment Detroit will highlight some of these through photo essays, blog posts and the like.

This one comes from Henry Ford Hospital, where orthopedic foot specialists provided free foot screenings and handed out new shoes and socks to the homeless during the Our Hearts to Your Soles charity event Tuesday at the Neighborhood Service Organization's 24-hour Walk-in Center in Detroit.

The Our Hearts to Your Soles event is part of the national event to distribute new and gently worn shoes to needy people in 40 states.

Nashville-based Soles4Souls™ facilitates the donations of both new and used shoes, which are used to aid people worldwide. Since its inception, Soles4Souls has distributed more than five million pairs of shoes in less than five years to people in 61 countries, including Honduras, Romania, Thailand, and the Sudan.

According to Dr. David Katcherian, M.D., division head of Foot and Ankle Surgery at Henry Ford Hospital:

We gave out slightly more than 140 pairs of brand new shoes and boots and 280 pairs of new socks. The shoes and boots were of the highest quality, (RedWing, Carhart, and Conti)  and were greatly appreciated by all. It was the biggest event we have had in terms of numbers of shoes, socks, and people.

Assisting me were my residents, Drs. Jason Nemitz and Ross Sherban, my medial assistant, Diana Millard, our Foot Care Nurse, Doreen Coggan, CNP, my daughter, Kristen Katcherian, and orthotists from Becker Orthopaedics, Douglas Goodnuff and Mark Vukov.  We were all assisted by Mr. Dean Carpenter, MSN, FNP-BC, Family Nurse Practioner of the Neighborhood Service Organization who helped organize the process.