Hope For Patients With Gadolinium-Induced Nephrogenic Systemic Fibrosis?

Brenda Fulmer

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A rheumatologist once told me that scleroderma patients were the “guinea pigs” of the medical world. These are the patients who are suffering the most horrible of diseases for which there are no known cures and physicians (and their patients) are willing to try just about anything in hopes of staving off the hardening of the skin and organs that eventually takes the lives of scleroderma sufferers. Patients suffering from gadolinium-induced nephrogenic systemic fibrosis share a lot in common with scleroderma patients – the progressive loss of use of their extremities due to skin thickening and contractures and the development of a rare and incurable disease that confounds medical science causes these injured victims untold anguish.

Rheumatologists at Massachusetts General recently published a study that provides some hope to patients who have been afflicted with nephrogenic systemic fibrosis as a result of their exposure to highly toxic gadolinium, a contrast agent commonly used in MRIs and angiograms. In this study, NSF patients were treated with imitanib mesylate (brand name Gleevec), a drug traditionally used to treat leukemia. NSF patients given Gleevec were noted to have regression of their skin thickening and lessening of joint contractures. Once the drug was stopped, however, the skin thickening and contractures returned. These positive changes in patients taking Gleevec were noted even though the patients continued to have the same levels of toxic free gadolinium in their bodies. Further study needs to be undertaken to determine whether NSF patients can be maintained on Gleevec on a long-term or chronic basis in hopes of stemming the devastating impact of this disease on their bodies and quality of life.