hand injuries

The hand hazards of working on the line at a meat plant

May 7, 2019

Amputations, fractured fingers, second-degree burns and head trauma are just some of the serious injuries suffered by U.S. meat plant workers every week, according to data seen by the Guardian and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism.

Functional prosthesis designed for people with partial finger amputations

May 7, 2019

Created by Naked Prosthetics , this prosthetic moves with a person's hand mimicking a natural finger. “For us, function is about getting somebody back to work, back to life, back to doing what they want to do," said Bob Thompson, CEO of Naked Prosthetics. They created the product to help the vast amounts of construction workers who've lost partial fingers and wanted to get back on the job.

Medical insights on hand injuries

Gloves mitigate the risks of crushes, pinching, blows & burns

M.B. Sutherland

December 4, 2018

We sat down with Dr. Joshua Alpert, an orthopedic surgeon at Midwest Bone & Joint Institute in the northwest suburbs of Chicago, to talk about the ins and outs of hand injuries. He helped us to understand why hand injuries can be particularly serious and what recovery from an injury looks like.

The importance of a hand safety plan

TJ Scimone

December 21, 2017

Every workplace has unique health and safety requirements: office settings aren’t hard-hat zones and crab fishers don’t worry about typing-related carpal tunnel syndrome. Yet hand safety is a concern regardless of environment or job type.

Assess risk & advanced materials to select cut-resistant gloves

Anthony Di Giovanni

April 1, 2017

Over the years, the industry has struggled to equate cut resistance with actual risk. The recent updates to the ANSI 105 and EN 388 standards will provide a more uniformed approach to assessing the cut resistant performance of gloves across the globe.

Safety at hand

Hand injuries can restrict movement, cause serious damage

Benita Mehta

February 1, 2017

Hands are one of the most complex parts of your body. Hand injuries that cause damage to one or all of those inter-meshing parts can make it difficult to do even the most simple tasks.

Multiple amputations at one Chicago manufacturing company

January 5, 2017

For the third time since the summer of 2015, a worker with a metal container manufacturer has suffered an amputation injury. In each incident, federal safety investigators found that, if the employer had complied with workplace safety standards, the injuries were preventable.

More than half of all injuries involve the hands

October 3, 2016

Recent statistics indicate that 51% of occupational injuries involve the hand and fingers. The most common types of hand injuries are traumatic injuries, contact injuries and repetitive motion injuries.

What do you know about degloving injuries?

October 3, 2016

With unprotected nip and pinch points being prevalent in many workplaces, it comes as no surprise that many workers suffer hand injuries. Hand injuries range from minor scratches and fractures to catastrophic injuries such as amputation, loss of digits, or degloving accidents.

Bartenders risk hand injuries, too

October 3, 2016

Squeezing limes for fresh juice may improve the taste of any summer cocktail, but for bartender Justin Fehntrich, it only left him with severe and blistered hands. On a hot summer day this past June, Fehntrich was bartending at a fundraiser on Fire Island, which required that he prep drinks by cutting up and squeezing 100 limes into pitchers for the guests’ cocktails directly under the sun.