Ronald Reagan suffers from it. So does former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. And now, a new injection treatment for Dupuytren's contracture, a relatively rare hand disorder, is the focal point of research being conducted by a team at Stony Brook University Hospital and Medical Center.

Prof. Marie A. Badalamente and Dr. Lawrence C. Hurst, professor and chairman of the orthopedics department, are using the injections on volunteers with the disorder, which deforms the hand.

The researchers have received a Food and Drug Administration grant to investigate the therapy. Funding was also provided by BioSpecifics Technologies Corp., The Lynbrook pharmaceutical firm that produces Cordase™, an injectable collagenase being used in the research. The firm specializes in wound healing and tissue regeneration.

Badalamente, a clinical researcher who holds a Ph.D., explained that the condition is a contracture deformity of the hands and fingers, "in which patients are unable to extend their fingers and do not have normal hand function." The disease is not an arthritic condition, she said, "but results from excess buildup of collagen in the palm and fingers which crosses joints and bends them down into a fixed position." Badalamente said that surgery for the disease can be tedious , often not resulting in complete restoration of hand use, and costly.

"If this new drug injection treatment is successful, it may be a safe alternative to surgery for this hand deformity," Badalamente said. She said the clinical study, now in its second phase, involves injecting the patient's hand with the collagenase, an enzyme that dissolves the collagen buildup.

Preliminary data from Badalamente and Hurst "based on about 30 patients indicate a very high order of success with one injection," according to a statement from the pharmaceutical company. The statement said Dupuytren's disorder is particularly prevalent among older people of Northern European descent. (It is named after Baron Guillaume Dupuytren, an 18th Century French surgeon who identified it.)

Badalamente said volunteers with the disorder are being sought.

A Mt. Sinai resident, Badalamente grew up in Roslyn and took both her undergraduate and graduate degrees at Long Island University C.W. Post College in Brookville. Badalamente, who also teaches medical residents at the university hospital, earned her doctorate at Fordham University.

For information on the clinical study, call 516-444-2215.

Reprinted with permission, c Newsday, Inc., 1997
By Bill Kaufman, Staff Writer