Realistically, the doctors in France are not Certified hand surgeons.

Well I had my visit to the hand surgeon last week regarding both hands with DC and to say he was dismissive would be accurate. His reply was that if it was that good and “main stream’ all hand surgeons would be doing NA. His most pointed remarks were regarding “The internet”. He even went on to say, “often the disease will wrap itself around a nerve…did the internet tell you that?” His assertion being that NA could not hope to release without damage to the nerves.

He did say he would keep an eye out in the journals and if it became main stream would look more closely at it. He was surprised at the numbers of successful procedures in France and the States, so perhaps he may do some further research, but I doubt if it will assist me in the short term.

He also said he had used “a needle” for some procedures on elderly patients but the results were not very good. When I suggested it may not be the same as the NA procedure, I think that is when his defences went up.

So its back to finding someone hopefully in Australia. I have sent a mail to the Dr in Victoria, but no reply to date. Maybe France or the States is the short term solution for me?

Had a reply from Dr David Huntersmith in Victoria. He has said

"I have performed a number of these procedures on relatively simple cases of Dupuytren’s contracture. I have been reasonably happy with the result, particularly with stage 1 and 2 disease.

Obviously there is an incidence of injury to the neurovascular bundles and early recurrence. I am unaware of any hand surgeons in Brisbane performing the procedure."

Not entirely sure regarding his comments on neurovascular bundling, he is going to France later this year or early next year. Think I may go and see him and get his opinion and talk through the procedure with him. Thoughts anyone?

"The fund research team are staggered that anyone would go for the open hand surgery if they can be treated by NA."

The majority of us who have had *both* OS and NA understand that once *all* the actual facts are clearly presented, the vast majority of patients will opt for NA as their initial procedure. I believe CHS will respect this and many will come around. However, the emergence of NA outside of France has been, and will continue to be, patient driven. We have just *that* much less to go now.

Congratulations Terry! Good on 'Ya Mate.

I'm off to Paris this saturday 10th September, thanks to information from Colin from Brisbane, who visited paris this year I booked my procudure and I hope I will return with straight fingers. I will post my results when I return.