Technical Tips
Patients with hand trauma often present with dirty hands from their work. Cleaning off oil, etc. from manual worker's hands can be difficult. After cleaning as much as possible, the skin can be prepared in the normal way and then a sterile glove placed on the patient's hand (awake patients can assist in this). Then, the tip of the glove of the finger(s) to be operated on can be cut with scissors and the glove rolled down the finger as a finger tourniquet. This isolates injured fingers from the rest of the hand (Fig. 1).
Figure 1.
Isolating injured finger with a sterile glove.