Dear Patient,

At your examination in my office, you were diagnosed with symptoms frequently associated with an inherited disease called Fabry disease. This disease is progressive and may result in kidney failure, heart disease and/or stroke later in life. At earlier stages, the most common symptoms noticed are episodes of intense pain in hands and feet, heat and cold intolerance, an inability to perspire, and a red to purplish rash in the belt to knee area. You may also experience stomach pain after meals and frequent bowel movements. Your ophthalmologist may have noticed deposits in your eyes that do not affect your vision.

If you have any of these symptoms, or if you have a family history of Fabry disease, I would like to recommend that you contact the Fabry Program at Albany Medical Center at 1-800-456-9900 or at their website fabrydisease.com. At your request, you will be provided with a testing kit that you may take to our office. Your doctor will draw a blood sample, and use the kit for testing the level of the enzyme alpha-galactosidase in your blood. This enzyme is absent or present at low levels in patients with Fabry disease, and therefore is diagnostic for Fabry disease.

Early diagnosis for Fabry disease is important now, since a treatment has become available that will stop the progression of the course of the disease and relieve the early symptoms. This treatment replaces the missing enzyme, which in turn will degrade deposits of a fatty substance in your blood vessels. These deposits are the cause of most of the symptoms of Fabry disease. Enzyme replacement therapy will help to relieve or prevent most symptoms. The treatment was FDA approved in April 2003. For more information contact Albany Medical Center.

I strongly recommend that you request your test kit and take advantage of the opportunity for early diagnosis and treatment.

Yours sincerely,