for those of you who have had good results with your sugury, what were some of the exercises that you did to help reduce scarring and stiffness in your hand. my surgeon told me to squeeze a ball and that was it.

i have had dc in my left hand for over 5 years. only in the palm, no contracture, affecting all four fingers and all have pits. no problems no pain. around a yaer ago i developed cd in my right hand. i have a deep pit in the index finger and only about a 10 degree contracture but very painful to the touch. then my pinkie went nuts. within a couple months i had 45 degree contraction and dc from the first joint to the bottom of my palm. no problem. six months ago it went to 80 degrees contracture. couldn't get my hand in my pocket or pass the table test so i went to the surgon at the local hospital. he said he had done several sugurys and it was time to get mine done. three months ago had incision from first joint to bottom of palm and a cast for 2 weeks. after removal of the cast and the stitches my hand looked great. finger was straight and the surgon said it looked perfect. a complete success. he said i should be good for 10 years. i asked him what i should do with my hand and he said i didn't need a splint and that i should work on stretching the finger and squeeze a ball. a couple weeks later i can easily touch my fingers to the palm but i have little squeezing strength. now 3 months after sugury i have a lot of scar tissue in the palm and it seems to be getting worse. i have 30 degree contracture and my third knuckle pops when i make a fist. the scar tissue has overlapped my ring finger tendon in my palm and is making it sore and stiff too. i hope it isn't the dc coming back with a vengence and just scar tissue. i hope it isn't too late to go and see someone else. hopefully some physical theropy will help. i really don't know what to do.

Kenny,
I cannot believe that a surgeon would not have you with a splint and initial therapy. There is not a website (that I have seen on the internet) that doesn't suggest that post-op therapy isn't extremely important. I did mine myself after the two visits to the therapist to get a night time splint and exercise program. My hand would have been a problem without the therapy. As it is, it is now as good as before I had DC.
You need to see someone immediately to get this going in the right direction. It sounds as though the surgery was successful, but the follow-up was not.

Jerry,
Your statement, "As for therapy: I found virtually no benefit from 6 months of basic therapy." Are you suggesting to Kenny (or anyone) that therapy is not important? If that is what you are trying to suggest, you are doing a real disservice to anyone going through any DC procedure.
We know your surgery was unusual and had a really poor outcome, but we need to separate what happened to you with what is a normal outcome. As with any type of surgery, there are those that have a bad result and that is the chance we all take whether it is heart surgery or DC.

Jerry,
I read a lot of stupid things in this forum, but, advising against therapy after surgery beats them all !