Hi Everyone,

Im new here today.

I went to the Dr yesterday and he confirmed that I had Dupuytren's disease. Initial reaction, WTF.

I went there to see why I had this hard small lump in the palm of my hand thinking it was some kind of ligament trauma or damage.

However the Dr knew straight away the problem. So my friends, I am in the club! :-) so to speak.

I'm 51, very fit and have always been active, especially with the hands, now now, no rude comments....I have worked manually a lot in my life, although I am not a manual labouror, I simply turn my hands to most things, excuse the pun.

However, and this is the point, I have narrowed the cause down to three possibilities I think.

Now, taking into account that I only noticed the dissease 2 months ago, I have had some clear activities and actions which may have caused the beginning of this disease, and at this stage I do not believe it is a disease, but caused by a trauma or repetitve action. Don't start getting rude again....

Last year, I was bitten on the hand by a dog, sever laceration to the inside small finger palm of hand, in other words the dog bit into the lower part of the hand both side tearing a gash 2 cm long on the soft part of the palm from the little finger and sunk his teeth into the upper rist behind the thumb. (cut was 2 cm away from Dupr disease, I went immediately to the hospital and took injections for rabies.

BTW, I was bitten in Portugal by a (saved from a pound) domestic dog (Akita) Never liked the way his blue eyes stared at me anyway...but I am dog friendly and have had many dogs, but this dog was from a dogs home and had not settled into domesticity yet. It was returned to the kennel as my friend would not allow a dog of such unpredictability to be in a domestic environment.

So, I had been bitten badly and had 3 stictches and the other teeth marks were cleaned up. I still have a small scar on the lower part of the soft tissue of the palm. It will never dissapear...Que sera.

Over the months I thought nothing of it and lived with the incident, further, BTW, my left hand has a scar some 10 centremetres long where I fell on a bottle playing Mud pies when I was five, the two little fingers dont work very well but a huge scar curling from the wrist (just before the main artery all the way through the palm to the index finger), my two little fingers are thinner than the right hand, but I still play the guitar with it.... and no sign of Dupuytren's disease there!

So, I am bitten by a dog and wonder if the shock/trauma may have been the itinital cause of the Dupuytren's disease.....however, 4 months ago, I assisted a friend of mine to move a factory full of pallets, it took a huge amount of effort some 8 weeks, moving pallet trucks, lifting, lots of hard pulling on pallet trucks etc, now Ive worked hard when I was young, in fact always, but I can still do a great deal of physical work and am not afraid of it, but there was a lot of hard hand work, pulling these heavy pallets on manual pallet trucks....and then setting up in the new factory, so a ton of hard physical work using much of the time my right hand more than left, or asserting more energy on the right hand.

So two very extreme elements, Dog and phycial movement up to 12 months before this shock of Dupuytren's disease.

A further point is that I have used a computer a lot in the past 2-3 years, using a mouse and typing right hand mouse, the mouse causes you to have a curled hand...lower fingers..

I believe one of these actions has caused the trauma to start Dupuytren's disease and I am split between the dog bite or the Factory Job. No disease runs in my family.

Anyway, so, I noticed in the past 2 months or so this Dupuytren's disease, and one of these events I believe has caused it, and I do not think it is a natural progression of age, or some other reason. Ofcourse I don't really know, but thats my story.

Mr England

Thanks for that....I will naturally continue to treat or care for the disease the best way I can, I like to be healthy....

I love what you just said it makes so much sense with this terrible disease. Thanks for making me feel better about all this! You should post this on the facebook dupuytren's wall for everyone to see.

Edited 09/15/10 18:18

There appear to be many ideas on what causes DC but I agree physical trauma(s) could be likely. Mine came about at about the same time I started to incorporate military push-ups to my exercise routine (which may have added stress to my palms when thrust to the ground). I am a 60 year old male in otherwise very good physical condition.

Macman:

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Hi Mr England.. Sorry to hear you are joining us but welcome anyway..

I find DD has some benefits..As my pinky is at 90 deg it sits well under my glass and hence I've never dropped a drink since it started.

May your hands remain strong, may your joints continue to serve you well, may your contractions be slow and your smile remain. Bless Mr England.