Night time splinting without surgery for dupuytren’s contracture – a successful case series of elderly diabetic patients

Abstract

Dupuytren’s contracture is a musculoskeletal deformity mainly involves fingers of the hands. Elderly diabetic patients more frequently suffer from the problem. Currently available options of treatment include needling, clostridium histolyticum injection and surgery. Following surgery patients are supposed to apply splint to correct the contracture. This study was conducted on early stage contracture, including 18 patients. All were advised to massage the area of contracture in the morning and at night followed by application of splint at night time. 16 patients showed complete recovery with average duration of 3.5 weeks. None of them has recurrence after three weeks of follow-up. The study concludes that the early stage contracture can be successfully treated by conservative measures