Retrospective analysis of hand injuries in children aged between 0 and 6 years: Clinical study

Hand injuries occur with a yearly increasing rate in the modern century and constituteapproximately 1/5 of the patients referring to emergency departments. There are only a few studiesin the literature regarding the analysis of hand injuries, risk of injury, possible precautions andtreatment approaches in the group of 0-6 years of age.507 children within the group of 0-6 years of age, who were treated for hand injuries in ourclinic from January 2006 to January 2011 were retrospectively investigated in our study. Cases wereevaluated with regards to the type of injury, the underlying reason, location, treatment approachand the outcomes. The reasons were crush and compression (55%), sharp objects (31,5%), burn(6,4%), falling (3,1%), foreign body (1,8%), forearm injuries (1,3%) and infections (0,8%).368 cases (72,6%) were domestic and 139 (27,4%) were outdoor injuries. Injuries were morefrequent (76%) in spring and summer. More injuries (80%) had occured between 14:00-20:00compared to other times of the day. Incidence of affected right/left hand was 2/1.321 of the cases (63,5%) were simple injuries while 185 (36,5%) were complex.14% of the cases received in-hospital treatment. 88.5% underwent surgery under emergencyconditions and 11,5% had elective surgery. Fingertip injuries were observed in 75,3% (382 cases) ofthe cases. The most common reason of these injuries was the finger being caught in a door.Among these, 32,3% (164 cases) were restored with primary suture, 43% (218 cases) hadnail-bed repair, 1,3% (7 cases) had foreign body extraction, 4,6% (23 cases) received composite graft,18,6% (94) were restored with local flap.It is known that there are only a few studies in the literature on hand injuries within thegroup of 0-6 years of age. Our study aimed to not only provide an analysis of the injuries in this agegroup but also aimed to constitute a database for the possible risk factors and the related protectionmethods.Accidents have been demonstrated as one of the major reasons of disability and death in thegroup of 0-6 years of age. Despite the variations among geographic groups and age groups, indooraccidents constitute 25% of all accidents. In a study conducted in our country, this rate was found tobe 18-25%. In another study including the group of 1-7 years of age, one third of the children werereported to have had a domestic accident within the recent year.Key Words: 0-6 Years of Age, Hand Injuries, Retrospective Study.