Tag Archives: dupuytren surgery

Can this natural Dupuytren treatment reverse the bad effects of needle aponeurotomy and Xiaflex injections?

Posted on by STL314

I was diagnosed with Dupuytren’s in 1994. I had a palmar fasciectomy in 2005 on the left hand which failed and resulted in amputation of my little finger in 2008. In 2011 I had a more extensive palmar fasciectomy on the right hand which has also failed. The little and ring finger of my right hand are fully contracted and the ring finger on my left is about 30% contracted and all are getting worse. Do you have data on how your treatments can reverse this condition and that of surgery, needle treatments and Xiaflex?

Are your treatments accepted by insurance companies? Mine, Molina, even denied covering Xiaflex, which I am fighting.

Thank you.

PS: I am very familiar with DMSO having used it on horses for years and would be open to trying it.

 

Greetings,

Sorry to hear of your bad results with Dupuytren’s hand surgery and Xiaflex injections.  Unfortunately, your experience is more common than what you might imagine.  Please see Dupuytrens Surgery Did Not Go Well   and When to have Dupuytren surgery?     Worsening of Dupuytren’s contracture is not uncommon after DC hand surgery, regardless if your Dupuytren’s surgery was initially successful or not.

As I have repeatedly written here on this DCI website, I am not able to produce data and research results like a multi-billion drug company that controls patient drug intake and has the ability to monitor outcomes.   I can only report what people tell me after they have been on their program for a while.

For every 10-12 reports of success and positive results while following a reasonably aggressive DCI treatment plan I get one report of failure or lack of positive results.  This is a good ratio, especially when you consider how people like to complain as opposed to give compliments and offer thanks.

However, you ask about reversal of bad results of Dupuytren surgery.  That is something you should have asked your various surgeons before they removed so much normal tissue from your hands, and injected enzymes to dissolve tissues in your hand.  Unfortunately you are asking too much of your body to think that taking any kind of superior nutritional program could possibly make new tissue grow back after a surgeon removed it.  It simply cannot be done.  At this point I think you should be interested in simply making the best of a very bad situation.

Since you have had such poor results with what you have tried so far I suggest that you be most conservative from this point forward.  I have never had anyone tell me of any adverse or unexpected results from the work we do here.  Please consider trying this approach to see if you can at least slow down some of the contraction that is going on in your hands.  At this time I think you do not have much to lose.  TRH 

Dupuytren surgery recurrence is always an important factor when deciding treatment options

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Dear Dr. Herazy,

My mother has had problems with her hands for a few years. We couldn’t find a cause of the problem. Recently one of the doctors diagnosed the disease name. He told her that it’s Dupuytren’s contracture. However, in South Korea, only available treatment is a surgery. It’s very rare disease over there. No doctors have much experience to perform that particular surgery. He recommended her to get treatment in the U.S in which many doctors are experienced to perform and other treatments are also available. Other than surgery, there are other options such as injections and needle treatment as the doctor recommended.

Therefore, she is flying to the U.S in early November to get her treatment. Length of her stay will be about one month. She doesn’t have medical insurance there so that she will be a cash patient. Please, recommend me which treatment is best for her with estimated cost. Currently ring finger on one hand is severe. However, ring finger on the other hand is getting serious as well. As she can’t stay in the U.S long enough, I would like to know what treatment is best for her situation.

When decisions are made, I would like to make an appointment for her so that she can get to her treatment as soon as she gets into U.S.  Please, reply me as soon as possible. You can reply on my email or give me a call to xxx-xxxx-xxxx. I am looking forward to hearing from you.

Thank you.

Greetings,

Since your mother is having to make such difficult and expensive travel plans to come from South Korea to the U.S. specifically for Dupuytren’s treatment, it is very important that you keep in mind that all Dupuytrens surgery will tend to recur.  This means that typically within a few years after the first surgery, the Dupuytren’s contracture problem will return usually worse than the first time around.  Dupuytren surgery recurrence of hand contracture is a major problem with all the treatment options you mentioned. 

The hand surgeons tend to minimize this problem of the Dupuytrens cords and nodules returning, but it is real and worth considering as you make your decision.  Since this would require another trip back to the U.S. and more expense for your family I suggest you ask many questions and read the information available on this website about Dupuytrens recurrence so you can judge for yourself what is the best direction to take.

There is no way for anyone to say which is the best treatment direction in her situation without knowing more about her particular problem and examining her.  

I suggest that she consider not having the Xiaflex injections, needle aponeurotomy or open hand surgery since all of these carry the risk of complications that could be extremely difficult to handle within the limited time she has available to her for treatment.   I suggest that she consider following a course of Alternative Medicine natural treatment for Dupuytrens contracture for perhaps a few months to see if her hands respond favorably to conservative management.  The advantage to this approach is that it is done without the risk of complications or recurrence.   If the procedure does not help her she can always submit to surgery at a later time.    TRH  

Is it normal to have numb fingers after Dupuytren hand surgery?

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hi doctor.
i had a fasciectomy 8 days ago for dupuytrens, yesterday i returned to hospital for re-dressing and hand clinic. When i returned home i felt my little finger and it was slightly numb around the tip and nail. i had not noticed this the previous week due to the dressing and splint holding my little, and ring fingers up. i’m just now wondering is this normal after that type of surgery and is it likely to return to normal. thank you
p.s i’m 31 years old

 

Greetings,

Palmar fasciectomy for Dupuytren’s contracture is typically a rather extensive and difficult  surgery; all hand surgery is complex because of the nature of hand anatomy.   Hand surgery is complex because the hand is such a tightly packed area in which muscles, tendons, ligaments, nerves, blood vessels – and of course fascia – are extremely close together with no open spaces or extra room in which to maneuver.   This complexity is better understood when you consider that in Dupuytren hand surgery there is foreign tissue in the hand – the internal Dupuytren cords – which are not supposed to be in the palm of the hand.  This extra tissue crowds into an already crowded part of the body.   Thus, a hand surgeon is faced with an especially complex and difficult task when she enters into such a situation.

A certain degree of temporary numbness and pain is to be expected after such a operation like a palmar fasciectomy.  A lot of delicate tissue was cut up, handled, stretched and probed, moved around, sewn up and altered in ways that the tissue have never experienced before.  Any numbness is understandable because delicate nerve tissue was traumatized in surgery, but these ares of numbness should pass in time; perhaps a month or two or more.  There is also the possibility that all or a portion of the numbness that you now have will remain.  The numbness might even increase because of tissue changes within the palm that might take place over the next several months as the hand heals after surgery; there is always a possibility that internal scar tissue will develop that can apply pressure or traction on nerves that could result in more numbness or even pain.  Anything is possible.   

It is unfortunate that you have not had any of this explained to you by your surgeon, for two reasons.  First, this would be especially true if your doctor knows you had a relatively easy and uneventful hand operation and it should have been explained that any numbness would be temporary and limited, so that you would not worry unnecessarily as you are now doing.  Or, second,  perhaps if the surgeon knew you had a relatively difficult and nasty hand operation.  It should have been explained to you that permanent numbness was unavoidable under the circumstances, so you would be prepared for the future – as you are not now prepared because apparently none of this was discussed with you.

Assuming that you surgeon is not a good communicator, I will further assume that something very important was also not explained to you.  Allow me to caution you that palmar fasciectomy is never a permanent correction or solution for Dupuytren’s contracture.  After any kind of Dupuytren’s surgery there is a tendency for the hand problem to recur; some types of Dupuytrens hand surgery have a faster recurrence rate than others, but they all are plagued by recurrence eventually.  You did not mention the type of of palmar fasciectomy you had, but for example in a partial palmar fasciectomy the recurrence rate is 66% in five years.   This means that after a palmar fasciectomy 2/3 or 66% of those patients will have recurrence by the 5th year.  What about the other 1/3 or 34% who do not have recurrence by year five?  They will likely have a recurrence in the 6th, 7th, 11th or later year, but it will recur.

This  Dupuytrens contracture recurrence after hand surgery is the reason why you will hear of so many people who have more than one had surgery on the same hand.

This number does not express the fact that of the 66% whose Dupuytren problem comes back within five years, not all of those patients have the recurrence happen in the 5th year; some have recurrence in the 4th, 3nd or 2nd year, and some even in the first year.  

You might say to yourself that this is a risk you are willing to take because you might be one of the lucky ones who does not have Dupuytrens recurrence until the 10th year or later after the palmar fasciectomy.  Yes, this is possible and perhaps you are willing to take that risk.  But, it is also true that after having the first hand surgery, the recurrence rate increases or gets faster for the second and all succeeding surgeries.   This means that  after developing a recurrence of Dupuytren’s contracture, in two years or 12 years or whatever,  if you choose to have a second palmar fasciectomy the recurrence rate will be sooner or faster than it was after the first hand surgery.   Further, if you have a third recurrence and have another hand surgery the recurrence rate will be even faster than after the second surgery.   Some patients who have a fast recurrence rate after the first surgery get into trouble rather quickly.

At age 31, as young as you are, you have many long and wonderful years ahead of you.  Because you have a lot of time to eventually have a recurrence of Dupuytren’s contracture, I caution you to take especially good care of both hands, do everything  you possibly can to keep your hands healthy and to do all that you can to avoid that second hand surgery.

The Dupuytren’s Contracture Institute is devoted to the non-surgical and non-drug treatment of this terrible hand problem.  It might be of interest and treat value to you to spend some time reading about the Alternative Medicine method we have researched to assist the self-repair of Dupuytren’s contracture.

Is the medium size Dupuytren treatment plan good for me?

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Hi Dr.

I stay in South Africa I have severe  dupuytren contracture in both hands.  I believe that its also part of my trigger fingers. I had operation in both hands to the ring and middle fingers.  Both my thumbs are starting to click as well.

Will your Plan B work for me and is this products available in South Africa.

I’m a 56 year old white male.

Regards,

Barend

 

Greetings Barend,

Sorry to hear that your hand problem and trigger fingers continue after having Dupuytren surgery in both hands.  No matter what kind of surgery you have to remove the Dupuytren’s contracture, it will always come back.  Occasionally it will take 8-10 years to come back, but most often the hand contracture will come back in just a few years; sometimes people say they can see and feel it begin to come back in just a few months. 

Trigger fingers are a common part of the Dupuytren problem because of the tissue inflammation that occurs below the surface of the palm.  

What you call Plan B I will assume is the DCI medium plan.  The medium plan is by far the most popular plan and could be effective to restore and support your ability to naturally heal your hand problem.  There is no way to predict ahead of time if and how much you might be able to eliminate the Dupuytren hand contractures.  Like everyone else, you will just have to work at it a few months and see how you respond.   Since you have already had Dupuytren’s surgery it would be beneficial to be aggressive in your care.  

DCI sends orders to South Africa weekly.  I am not aware of any source in your country for these products; that is why so many people order from us.  Please let me know what I can do to help you.  TRH 

 

 

Is it common for lumps to be found on the bottom of the feet?

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I have those lump in my hands and also under my feet. Is it common for lumps to be found on the bottom of the feet?

I’m 59 and still active with my hands and my fingers.  My fingers have not yet started to pull in yet as it did with my father and grandfather as they got older.

My neighbor had the operation and had complications and almost lost a finger because of the Dupuytren surgery.  That is why I’m looking for other alternatives.  Thank you.

 

Greetings,

When these lumps appear on the palm of the hand and later develop cords that bend the fingers down, it is called Dupuytren’s contracture.  When a similar process of lumps developing on the bottom of the feet, it is called Ledderhose disease.   About 5-10% of people who have Dupuytren’s contracture will also have Ledderhose disease. 

Complications from hand surgery for Dupuytren’s contracture are far more common than what you will see mentioned when the doctors write articles on the Internet.  DCI is not against Dupuytrens surgery, but advises that a person tries alternatives to see if the palm lumps can first be reduced or eliminated so that their is no need for surgery.   There is a lot of information to help you find alternative treatment ideas on the DCI website; you can find help at Start Dupuytren treatment.