Say you’re of sound mind, you’ve got a bit of a drinking problem, and you present to an ER intoxicated with a necrotic ankle secondary to osteomyelitis. The only treatment is to amputate your foot, but you don’t want to do that. It’s not hurting because the bone is dead – it looks grotesque but hey, you can kind of hobble around and cover it up so no one sees it. The problem is eventually you’ll become septic and die. You don’t want to be admitted because you’ve got a date with a bottle. If you’re the doc, what do you do?
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