This 5 minute safety talk will cover the topic of hand protection.
Hands
The hands are one of the most used tools of the human body , it is said that they represent 80% of the activities carried out by a person.
Now imagine what you would do if you were missing one of them. The hands are one of the first parts of the body to be exposed during an activity.
Why is the hand so important?
A person uses his hand for almost all the activities he performs, such as holding tools, using a hammer to strike, unscrewing a screw, removing a bolt with a wrench, among others.
One of the main fingers of the hand is the “thumb”, this finger is considered the most important since it fulfills the main function of support and grip. Now let’s think that we are going to hold the handle of a hammer without having the thumb, we could not do it since we do not have the opposite thumb to do such a task.
How can I protect my hand?
In occupational safety and health, there are safety implements that serve to prevent or reduce the effects of an incident or accidents , such as leather gloves type bait, these gloves are used to hold items with rough surfaces or sharp edges so that cannot injure the hands.
Another implement is the hot work glove, it is used to hold, move or remove objects that are hot (at temperatures of more than 200 ° C). This requires a glove that insulates the heat emitted by the object and can be held by the worker without suffering a hand burn.
Protection and injuries
The protection of the hands should be one of the important activities that a worker must internalize and make their own care.
The most frequent injuries to the hands are:
- Carpal Tunnel Syndrome and Other Repetitive Motion Injuries.
- Cuts and amputations.
- Tendonitis.
- Burns from chemicals or heat
- Crush or entrapment fractures
Last conclusions
The prevention of hand injuries must start by oneself, since we use personal protective equipment, comply with safety regulations and report unsafe conditions we can reduce the probability of suffering an injury.
