Neglected Treatment for Hand Injuries: Pain

Hand injuries are a common reason for emergency room visits, and it is critical to managing the pain process effectively. This study aims to look at the demographics, pain assessment, and management of patients who visited the emergency department with hand injuries.

Healthy patients over 18 who presented to the emergency room within the first 24 hours of an acute hand injury between December 2020 and February 2021 were included. The Numerical Pain Rating Scale was employed to assess pain severity. The etiology of the trauma, pain scale, analgesic treatment, imaging requests, consultation, and tetanus vaccine situation were all documented.

The patient's pain severity was classified at admission. It was found that 38.8% had mild pain, 39.2% moderate, and 21.9% had severe pain. The average pain scores of the patients were determined as 4.89±2.14. Analgesic was executed in 13.5% of the patients who applied, and 86.5% did not receive painkillers. Analgesia was applied to 2% of the patients with mild pain, 14.7% with moderate pain, and 31.6% with severe pain. We found that as pain severity increased, analgesia was more, and it was found to be statistically significant (p=0.0001).

Analgesia is a neglected step in trauma care. Emergency physicians should prioritize pain relief. All patients with hand trauma should be pain-scored and given appropriate analgesia.