Dupuytren’s Disease

About Dupuytren’s Disease

If you have bumps in your palm, you might have Dupuytren’s disease. The bumps are from tissue thickening under the skin. Sometimes this thickening limits the ability to straighten your fingers. Most of the time it just causes bumps, and you can still straighten your fingers. Scientists have yet to determine when Dupuytren’s disease will cause an inability to straighten fingers or how to prevent or delay the process.

Risk Factors for Dupuytren’s Disease

Risk factors for Dupuytren’s disease may include:

• Family history: Dupuytren’s Disease is more common in people with British or Northern European heritage.

Treating Dupuytren’s Disease at UT Health Austin

Our goal is to help increase your confidence and help you keep to your routine. Our team will assess your bumps and work with you on managing the condition.

If you can’t straighten your finger, there are some treatment options. Sometimes the problem can be addressed by anesthetizing the skin and poking the tight area repeatedly with a needle until it gives way, allowing the finger to straighten a bit more. With this needling procedure, there is no skin incision to heal, although sometimes the skin tears open a bit when the finger straightens. There is some swelling, bruising, and soreness that goes away over a few weeks.

If the disease does not respond to needling, we can perform outpatient surgery under local anesthesia in our office operating room.

Care Team Approach

At UT Health Austin, we take a multidisciplinary approach to your care. This means you will benefit from the expertise of multiple specialists across a variety of disciplines caring for you in one place to avoid having to schedule multiple appointments with providers at locations all over the city. The Musculoskeletal Institute care team includes orthopedic surgeons, sports medicine physicians, physician assistants, physical therapists, physiatrists, chiropractors, nurse practitioners, dietitians, social workers, and more who work together to help you get back to the things in your life that matter most to you.

We collaborate with our colleagues at the Dell Medical School and The University of Texas at Austin to utilize the latest research, diagnostic, and treatment techniques, allowing us to customize a treatment plan specific to you. Treatment may include nonsurgical interventions, such as lifestyle modifications, physical therapy, or medication and injections, or surgery may be the best course of action to help improve your pain and function. Advanced imaging and lab testing are also available on-site if needed.

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