The Founders Story

Sidney Weiser, DPM

Founder & President of QPG

As I child, I knew I was going to be a doctor. My dad, a Holocaust survivor, was a huge proponent of education. He never had the opportunity to attend high school and he had major ambitions for me, his oldest son, to study medicine. In retrospect, it is hard to differentiate which was the main impetus for my career, his strong power of suggestion or my own internal ambition to make a difference in the world. In the end, I chose podiatry, a professional decision I have never regretted and passionately enjoy.

What I Like About Podiatry

What I like about podiatry is the merging of medical and surgical aspects inherent in the profession. Caring and sensitive by nature, I have also always been drawn to the senior population, the often-dominant demographic in a podiatric practice. Even as a child, I gravitated to the older folks at family gatherings and had this powerful urge to keep them healthy and safe. A stable lower extremity is a precursor to safety and good health.

When I graduated from podiatry school, I joined a private practice that specialized in surgical procedures on the feet including bunions, hammertoes, entrapped nerves, and web toes. The practice was an early adaptor of AO fixation, the Swiss compression technique which was new at the time and involved the placement of screws, wires, and plates to provide stability to the surgical site and reduce the pain of surgery during the recuperation period. The practice also provided podiatric services to residents of long-term care facilities, reinforcing my passion for providing care to seniors.

My first practice experience allowed me to not only provide routine care to patients but also master the skills of a surgeon. Taking a deformed foot and restoring it as close to normal as possible, gave me immense professional gratification. I was hooked.

Quality Podiatry Group

Within a year, I started my own private practice and two years later, I created Quality Podiatry Group, a consortium of licensed podiatrists providing services to the residents of long-term care facilities in Illinois. In 2009, we expanded Quality Podiatry Group to include residents in nursing homes and assisted living facilities in Florida. Today, QPG has a cadre of talented professional podiatrists providing care to more than 200 long-term care facilities in two states.

When I was in podiatry school, I had this recurring dream that I retrofitted a bus and traveled from place to place, providing services to those in need. As president of Quality Podiatry Group, I feel like I have fulfilled my father’s expectations as well as my own dream…minus the bus.