Hand Injuries—Still Poorly Managed

Excerpt

There are 1700 injuries related to hand tools per hundred thousand farm workers per year in rural India. Productivity was impaired to the tune of 24,000 days per hundred thousand population because of injuries caused by hand tools on these farms [1]. Many of our patients in the villages get crush injury to the hand due to sugarcane crusher and other instruments used in farming. Injuries to the hand are also commonly seen in housewives as most of the household work has become mechanized like mixie, washing machine and vacuum cleaner etc. With rapid industrialization in our country industrial hand injuries also account for a high number of injuries in our country. The incidence of injuries was 36 per 10,000 workers per year. 47% were due to entrapment of the hand in active machines, 25% occurred during lifting and transportation of heavy objects and 12% while handling tools. The injuries resulted in residual deficit in 55% of cases and were serious enough to require absence from work of more than four weeks in 48% of cases. On an average 35 days were lost per injured worker, according to a report from Jaipur published as early as 1988 [2]. If these injuries are not being treated properly immediately and rehabilitation of that hand is not instituted the whole family suffers whether it is the breadwinner or home maker. …