Hand injuries can be classified into physical injuries, chemical injuries, mechanical injuries and biological injuries. Among them, mechanical injuries are the most common. Mechanical injuries to the hand are classified into closed and open types. The former can affect bones, joints and tendons, and sometimes even nerves. The latter is even more serious, causing heavy bleeding and affecting other parts of the body, and is also more complicated to treat. The severity of hand injuries varies greatly, depending on the factors causing the injury and the process involved.
Cuts and punctures are common in work. Minor cuts only affect the skin tissue, while severe ones can damage other tissues and even cause partial or limb amputation. Stab wounds can be more serious because there may be foreign objects in the wound. The healing of open hand injuries is closely related to the degree of dirt on the hand at the time of injury. Generally speaking, injuries in chemical plants, slaughterhouses, meat processing plants and leather product factories are highly likely to cause infections and be accompanied by other complications.
Due to the extensive use of high-pressure spray and jetting equipment in modern industry, the number of hand injuries caused by jetting has significantly increased. This kind of situation can be seen in internal combustion engines, spray guns, grease injection guns, plastic injection molding machines and some special equipment for auto repair, etc. If the spray does not hit the skin along the tangential direction, it will not cause the skin to crack. At the initial stage, it is merely a stinging sensation, which is often not taken seriously. It is not until the pain intensifies due to local ischemia that it becomes serious. Sometimes, even if the amount of the spray is not large and causes local ischemia, after several days, thermal or chemical stimulation effects will occur. As the spray contains solvents, it may cause systemic poisoning symptoms.
Hand burns can be caused by fire, red heat, hot air currents, chemicals or electric shock. The degree of injury depends on the duration of contact, the area and depth of the burn. Because such injuries occur frequently, they can sometimes be very serious. The harm caused by exposure to toxic, irritating or allergenic chemicals, although without external injuries, the resulting skin damage must not be ignored. It is one of the three major routes of occupational poisoning.
Measures to protect hands: First, when designing, manufacturing equipment and tools, full consideration should be given from the perspective of safety protection, and relatively complete protective measures should be equipped. Second, it is necessary to rationally formulate and improve safety operation procedures and perfect safety prevention facilities. For instance, protective covers should be installed on the dangerous parts of the equipment, shielding should be set up against heat sources and radiation, and reasonable hand tools such as handles should be provided. If the above measures still fail to effectively prevent accidents, personal protective equipment can be considered. Protective gear can be roughly divided into protective gloves, finger cots, hand pads, sleeves, elbow pads, etc.
There is hardly any job that doesn't come to hand. The hand is like a delicate tool, possessing astonishing strength and flexibility, capable of grasping, rotating, pinching and manipulating. In fact, the connection between the hand and the brain is the key for humans to be competent in various high-skilled jobs. However, if you neglect the basic safety rules at home or at work, there will be serious problems with your hands.
No matter where you work or play, the three types of hand injuries include: traumatic injury after an accident, contact injury caused by exposure to toxic substances, and repetitive activity problems resulting from excessive use of a certain group of muscles.
Traumatic injuries include abrasions, lacerations (cuts), contusions, fractures and compression injuries. Traumatic injuries usually occur when machines and tools are used carelessly. Contact injuries occur when your hands come into contact with harmful substances, such as cleaning agents or chemicals. Burns can also be contact injuries. Repetitive movement problems occur in jobs that require prolonged repetitive use of hands.
Identifying risk factors and formulating relevant safety measures to prevent them can reduce the chances of hand injuries by 500,000 times each year. The chance of hand injury should be minimized as much as possible, and hand safety requires joint efforts. All we need to do is learn the basic safety rules and abide by them.
Hand injury accidents often occur due to potential safety hazards in production and work. It is impossible for an accident to happen for no reason. There are potential safety hazards in four aspects: unsafe human behavior, unsafe conditions of items, the influence of adverse environments, and deficiencies in management.
The occurrence of hand injury accidents may be caused by the lack of safety awareness of the enterprise's responsible person, impractical safety work, failure to implement it seriously, operators not following the rules, or chaotic management. The person in charge of the enterprise has not truly implemented various organizational and technical measures in labor protection, there is a behavior of emphasizing production over safety, and there is a serious absence in enterprise management, resulting in the imperfection or mere formality of the safety management system, etc. Even many enterprises' production workshops and assembly lines have not established sound operation charters, rules and complete safety protection measures. Or even if there are safety operation charters and rules, their managers only talk about them, do superficial work and deal with inspections, without strengthening safety production management.
Many enterprises have outdated equipment, aging machines, inadequate maintenance, poor working conditions and perfunctory safety inspections. Safety education and training are inadequate, perfunctory and formalistic. Employees start working without understanding or being familiar with safety operation procedures, rules and regulations, and machinery and equipment. When operating, they take risks or operate blindly based on their own superficial knowledge. Employees are accustomed to this situation, become complacent, indifferent, have no sense of danger and have a mentality of taking chances. For the sake of convenience and effort, some people did not follow the rules, operated in violation of regulations, and made operational mistakes, which eventually led to hand injury accidents.