Hazim Ahmed^1,, Amal Sharaf², Julie Mcglaughlin³, Haitham Khashaba⁴

Due to disease control measures, the number of elderly people increases in the community making them more actively participating in different kinds of activities. DIY-related hand injuries are common and can be severe and disabling. Recent statistical figures from NHS Digital show that there were more than 5,600 admissions in England for powered hand-tool hand injuries, and more than 2,700 for non-powered hand-tool injuries, between 2020-2021. In the Northeast region, we noticed increasing DIY-related hand injuries among older age groups. 14% of the injuries among the elderly seen at emergency departments are related to the upper limb trauma, while 29% of them related to the hand and wrist. The mode and level of injury are important determining factors for the functional outcome. Distal and clean-cut injuries carry far better prognosis than proximal and crush injuries. Patients who underwent surgical intervention especially replantation or revascularization, may be in need for secondary procedures. This will depend on the extent, mechanism, level of injury, adequacy of soft tissue coverage and post operative rehabilitation. Several factors may help in decision making regarding the need for replantation or revascularization. These factors include ischemia time, mechanism of injury, level of amputation, patients’ age and profession, and other concomitant life-threatening injuries Replantation, revascularization became more successful due to recent advances in microsurgical team. Return of function after replantation is an important factor to determine if the replantation was saucerful or not. Those patients may require secondary procedures.

Circular saw, retirement, hand injury, socioeconomic, DIY