Dr. Katherine Elizabeth Foley, MD

I wish I could say I had a positive experience with Dr. Foley. I went to Dr. Foley for treatment of a fistula. We scheduled a fistulotomy along with a colonoscopy. When I woke up from anesthesia, I did not have the procedure as discussed, instead I had 3 drainage stitches in my bottom. She informed me, she didn’t want to cut through muscle tissue, as it could lead to further complications, along with the fact that she found inflammation. Through the colonoscopy, I was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease. When I reported complications from the colonoscopy, she dismissed it. When I reported further complications from the colonoscopy, including inflamed stitches and bleeding, she again dismissed it as a Crohn’s flare up. Her best medical response was shrugging and saying “Hang in there”. When I told the gastroenterologist she recommended, he put me on immunosuppressants using 5 month old blood work to determine I most likely didn’t have an infection to worry about. I even asked her, if… she felt she was not capable of treating me, and if she would like to recommend a different doctor. Her medical assistant informed me she felt confident in her ability to treat me. However I did have an infection I most likely picked up during the colonoscopy she did. After 12 weeks of dealing with chronic pain from the inflamed stitches and diarrhea, I got a second opinion, and was diagnosed with a bacterial infection. Now I have further complications from having a 3 month bacterial infection. My prostate is enlarged from chronic infection, and my bladder wall is thickening, and now I have to urinate between 8 and 12 times a day. She did apologize, and said it was really unfortunate I was the patient she had to learn on, and she was very sorry. However, her apology doesn’t make up for the hair loss, chronic diarrhea, missing work, missing my friend’s wedding, worrying my friends and family, and having to deal with very uncomfortable stitches for 12 weeks. I spent 12 weeks not healing because Dr. Foley made several mistakes. At no point, in the whole time I saw Dr. Foley, did she follow up on my issues with any diagnostic work. When I reported several post-surgical complications, she ignored them. After getting a second opinion, and having a whole host of questions as to her treatment methods, she would not respond to any questions regarding my care. I’ve sent several messages and her medical staff informs me she has received them, she simply isn’t responding. The second surgeon said she would be able to do the fistulotomy because all of the fistulas did not look like they contained muscle. It will involve 3 surgeries as well as multiple invasive tests. Which is slightly concerning, given that Dr. Foley said she did not want to cut into any muscle. Dr. Foley never even checked to see if the fistulas did involve any muscle tissue as far as I know. Because Dr. Foley didn’t respond to any of my medical questions about my plan of care, it was immensely more difficult to make medical decisions because she refused to answer any questions about my plan of care. I have to make the decision to start with a new surgeon at square one. I have to figure out if I need to go through another colonoscopy, go through MRIs and CTs, and the possibility of 3 more surgeries blind. 4 months of dealing with issues all for nothing. Because Dr. Foley refuses to answer my medical questions, I have to figure out what my new plan of care will be without any input as to the last 4 months. After 4 months of dealing with Dr. Foley, my health is far worse than when I started treatment with her. I would severely recommend seeing any other surgeon before working with Dr. Foley. Perhaps the most egregious part is, I’m still making payments on the procedure Dr. Foley did. Every month I get a friendly reminder for the automatic payment posting for a procedure that complicated my health, and caused damage to my body.