Finger amputation

[LBrown59]

Lots of stubbies on the site . I was a meat cutter for years and have been to the ER ( or even stitched at home after work) several times.
We used to get 60 lbs cases of bull meat to mix with lean trimmings to make ground beef. They came in frozen and you'd cut them into strips on the band saw so you could feed it thru the grinder. I was talking to my buddy one day while I was zipping strips off...zing, zing, zing and my right hand slipped off the side of a frozen block and straight towards the blade. I jumped back and threw my hands up in the air and started laughing and yelled "Hey Wayne, did you see that? I almost cut my freaking hand off!!
Well, Ol Wayne was standing there looking at me like I had lost my mind with his mouth wide open. I knew something was wrong and I looked up at my right hand...now with the end of my thumb hanging by skin. Didn't even feel it. A fast/sharp cutting instrument is almost painless, even thru bone. In fact, it didn't start hurting for probably 10-15 minutes. Middle finger on left hand is fused from being reattached at middle joint. A sharp boning knife will separate a joint with ease.
I've worked in corrections for 11 years now and I will tell you, supervising 100 inmates by yourself is easier and safer than what I used to do.

A guy I know lost all his fingers and almost all his thumb on his right hand back in the late 50 or early sixtes .
He was a teanager working in a grocery store and got his hand caught in a meat grinder at work there one day..
Another older fellow I know lost all 4 fingers on one hand back in the late 40 or early 50s in a corn picker .

Lost to the first joint of these two fingers in a double tripping press brake when I was 17 working after school. (all boys technical high school) Not long after a friend lost everything on one hand except his thumb in a similar machine at a different company. As a former tool and die maker/machinist I've seen a lot of injuries. I didn't pass out but my stomach did a couple of slow rolls. The company was indifferent to employee safety and many men there had lost several fingers. Companies should lookout for those that labor in their fields. Workmen's comp keeps you from suing them.
Yes, I still miss those fingers but I'm convinced the loss saved my life. I was 4F'd because of them when called up for the Vietnam draft.

We had a plant here that made fire proof safes from back in the thirties to about 2002 when it closed down..
It had all kinds of punch and brake presses in the machine room department.
It was almost common practice for people to loose fingers even hands working in that dept.
I went to work there in 1967. I worked in that dept for about 3 to 6 months till I got a job in another dept.
I left the plant in 1973.
I still have all 10 fingers and thumbs.
I was one of the lucky ones.
During that 5 years there were lots of fingers lost .
and many many more than that before then.
My brother worked there from 1968 to 1998.
He got out with all his fingers and thumbs but a lot of others weren't so fortunately as there were lots of accidents during that 30 years.
I can remember walking in the plant and seeing drops of blood trailing along the floor occasionally which always meant somebody had gotten one or both hands in a press.

 

[Ductape]

I'm in the club too......

 

[Kernopelli]

We called those cases shank meat. I cut meat for 15 years and never cut myself on the bandsaw. With a knife is a different story. One good thing about cutting yourself while cutting meat is your hands are usually really cold and they don't bleed much.

Terry

We used a lot of shank meat too. I would hate to even speculate how many tons through the years. We had a small local packer that sold shank meat that we used quite a bit but also sold 90% lean bull meat...literally slaughtered bulls they bought. I just always remember it was a case of bull I was cutting when I did that. 19 years and that was the only time I cut myself on the saw. The finger happened boning whole fresh hams. We would bone and tie 15 hams every Monday afternoon and put them on the smoker the next morning. One quick slip in exactly the right place is all it takes.

 

[czechsonofagun]

Yes, I am a club member also. Cut a kerf in my middle finger on table saw (left hand) and lost half an inch of my pinkie (also left hand) in a jointer.

Curiously, all is healed, but the kerf hurts more in cold than the pinkie.

I can only second the pain killer need. Nothing hurts like whats missing.

 

[edkinct]

Sorry to hear about your finger,
I am in the club also, just a different limb, see my pic to the left.

 

[Kfbeal]

Man, I'm sorry to hear about everyone else's misfortunes with power tools and other objects. It's amazing how fast these things happen.

edkinct, I like your signature. Pretty much sums it all up.

 

[Ductape]

Sorry to hear about your finger,
I am in the club also, just a different limb, see my pic to the left.

Looks like you have out-done most of us !

 

[Nomoregears]

I've got all my digits but not all of them bend correctly. I was polishing a gun barrel on a lathe when the emery cloth caught the dovetail and wrapped my pinky backwards. It's fused in a crook now. Broke another finger coaching little league. That finger is crooked and very arthritic now. So, I'm blessed and I feel for you guys who lost digits or part of your leg.
Please be safe ya'll.

 

[JB4310]

I'm blessed and I feel for you guys who lost digits or part of your leg.
Please be safe ya'll.

Yes that's an exclusive club I hope I never get to join!!!

Good Luck,
JB.

 

[czechsonofagun]

Didn't loose a finger, but went to doctor this Tuesday to get my hand stitched. Our great pyrenese likes to walk the neighborhood from time to time and when she gets back, the younger airedale (female, of course) tends to punish her for it.

It is 7 in the morning, my oldest goes to wait for the school bus and comes back in: the dogs are fighting. I have done it plenty of times in my life, I go out, reach for the scruff of the neck to get the airedale of the pyrenese. They moved, I missed and the pyrenese got me this gash on the back of right hand next to the middle finger knuckle about 2 inches long.
Long story short - 4 stitches from a doctor and antibiotics for infection I am taking little rest from all my projects, it is complicated enough to drive stickshift and type on a keyboard Doc said I am lucky, she didn't get any muscles, it was deep but only skin to heal.

AFAIK the best way to deal with dogs is to pull them out of the fight by rear legs, never to touch the biting end, but it takes two to do it.

 

[ninefinger]

I had zero pain until PT. The first time I saw my hand after surgery put me in a cold sweat, I could not believe how ugly the hand was. WCH and Duct have been good therapy for me. I had no trouble accepting I had done this to myself but still think it is ugly but, and I can not explain it well but my attitude about it is somehow different.

 

[CurlyDave]

AFAIK the best way to deal with dogs is to pull them out of the fight by rear legs, never to touch the biting end, but it takes two to do it.

I have always considered the tail as a very convenient "handle" for this kind of situation.

A lot of times, no pulling at all is required, just wrapping it around one hand with the other in order to get a good grip gets their attention.

- - - -

On the original topic, always get medical attention for a finger injury.

I used to work with a guy who injured his pinky just before he started work. Well, insurance doesn't cover preexisting conditions, and he didn't think he had the money to get it looked at.

Over the course of a few months the finger started to stick out at right angles to his hand, and his "solution" was to wear an EMT coupling on that finger and try to adjust it back by tightening the locking screw. He wasn't very mechanically inclined and I could see that the screw was actually forcing the finger into a worse position, but he was real sensitive about it and wouldn't take any suggestions.

A couple of years later the finger wouldn't move at all and stuck straight out 90 degrees to the way it should.

 

[tatorkrisp]

Ya, im 16 and i recently lost the tip of my right ring finger. I was building inground pools with my step dad. The pool is made of steel pannels and a radius panel has "V" shapes in them. I was hanging on and standing on rocks and the rocks slipped from under me and my finger got caught in the "V"-shaped steel. It cut to the bone from the bottom of finger and cut off the top joint.

 

[Kfbeal]

Ouch, that sounds painful.

Strange but a few weeks ago my 3 year old son was helping my wife with a manual can opener. Our daughter ran up and not sure what happened but he ended up crying so we assumed it got smashed in it. He complained a little the next day and the following day he was worse and it started turning white and swelling. We went to the pediatrician and he said it was infected so we went to a plastic surgeon. He was then admitted into the hospital due to the pain and they performed surgery the next morning.

It looked as if he was bit by a rattlesnake. I felt so bad that we couldn't do anything to help him. I wanted so bad to stick it with a hot needle.

Like father like son I guess. It looks good now, and the nail is almost grown back over. The doc removed it to clean out all the infection.

 

[timswi]

I cut 3 of my fingers off on a tablesaw when I was 15..They put two back on. One works, one doesn't, one's gone...Upside, I can count in fractions

 

[D7E]

I lost 1/2 my left thumb and the end of 2 fingers all in different incidents throughout my time all of which i was told probably would'nt re-take due to beaing roughly torn and not clean cut with farm machinery but they all still work....I have no feeling in 2 of them though and missing 1 nail....Shooting has never been the same since..?

 

[Attila the Hun]

February 2009.

I am a toolmaker and a mechanical engineer technician, age 32.
(actually I used to be till i got laid off)

My injury happened at home when I was milling a piece of 4x4 wood. I was using a 1" cutter (end mill). Mistake was on my part, I lifted up the cutter with right hand (like a drill press), then left thumb checked the milled part if I milled the feature to the line that I drew before. Right hand got a signal from my brain to go down, while my left thumb received no signal of moving out of the way. Consequence,left thumb tip removed, with finger nail at a slant angle. I new something happened, but I expected a minor cut, I couldn't believe my eyes what I saw, it haunts me to this day. For 10 seconds I just stood their and could not believe what happened, then the animal instict took over. My whole family was home, noone knew who's gonna drive me to ER, so I took a towel wrapped around my hand and drove myself to ER with one hand, I didn't stop at any red light.

Thanks to our health care system, I was asked to file a form, which I denied and asked for a doctor. I was put into a room, after 6 minutes came a nurse and checked my blood pressure on my left hand (the injured hand). I screamed from the top of my lung, after that 4 nurses came into the room and put me on a bed. At that point I was shaking like a paint mixer. After half an our a kid walks into the room, turned out he was the doctor. He wanted to remove my thumb from the joint. I said "no". Then he made a phone call to a hand surgeon (this was on Saturday), I was told to go to that surgeon. I called Monday the surgeon's office, and thanks again for our health care system, I couldn't see the doctor on Monday, because I had no appointment, even though I told the ***** at the office that I have an open wound, and needs attention. At the ER the staff did nothing but to clean up the wound, and take my $50. Anyway finally I saw the hand surgeon on Tuesday, he saw my condition, and the next day Wednesday, the reconstructive surgery took place.

My thumb is 1/3 shorter then the other, I don't have a finger nail, that was totally removed. I am still trying to get used to it. It's different. I can grip things, but pushing on something is different, I can not exert as much force as before, plus the bone hurts sometimes. I wonder if that will toughen up a little?

If anyone with similar thumb injury please e-mail me.

Attila

 

[aczlan]

My whole family was home, noone knew who's gonna drive me to ER, so I took a towel wrapped around my hand and drove myself to ER with one hand, I didn't stop at any red light.

Wouldn't it have been safer to call an ambulance?

Thanks to our health care system, I was asked to file a form, which I denied and asked for a doctor

Why are you blaming the health care system? The hospital needs to know your past medical history, who you are and who is paying for your "visit" that will not change no matter what. Also, calling an ambulance would have gotten you around this mess.

I was put into a room, after 6 minutes came a nurse and checked my blood pressure on my left hand (the injured hand)

OUCH

I was told to go to that surgeon. I called Monday the surgeon's office, and thanks again for our health care system, I couldn't see the doctor on Monday, because I had no appointment, even though I told the ***** at the office that I have an open wound, and needs attention. At the ER the staff did nothing but to clean up the wound, and take my $50. Anyway finally I saw the hand surgeon on Tuesday, he saw my condition, and the next day Wednesday, the reconstructive surgery took place.

That sounds like the hospital should have made an appointment for you, the staff there probably know the staff at the hand surgeons office and can get schedules rearranged with more ease than you can (and those schedules are probably made at least a week or two out, which has to do with how busy they are, not the health care system). However it sounds like the surgeons office got you in pretty quick.

In the end (assuming that your insurance covers it) calling the ambulance will get you into the hospital in an urgent care situation MUCH faster and safer than driving yourself in will. Or so say the people who I know that are on ambulance crews.

Aaron Z

 

[ebennettlima]

If you work with tools & machinery sooner or later there will be a catastrophe. Lost to the first joint of these two fingers in a double tripping press brake when I was 17 working after school. (all boys technical high school) Not long after a friend lost everything on one hand except his thumb in a similar machine at a different company. As a former tool and die maker/machinist I've seen a lot of injuries. I didn't pass out but my stomach did a couple of slow rolls. The company was indifferent to employee safety and many men there had lost several fingers. Companies should lookout for those that labor in their fields. Workmen's comp keeps you from suing them.

Left the machine shop and went into engineering, but still work in my shop welding, machining etc. Always getting burned, cut, mashed etc. it just goes with the territory. Worth it all though. I've sawmilled, finished concrete and every other thing and have received few injuries for the activity I've been involved in.

Yes, I still miss those fingers but I'm convinced the loss saved my life. I was 4F'd because of them when called up for the Vietnam draft.

lost my hole right index finger it looked like yours to start but then they took it all off due to infection

 

[ebennettlima]

does it still hurt mine cramps up and hurts every day at work and i have aful phamtom pains in the winter