Cosmetic Surgery Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Cosmetic Surgery, including details on microsurgery, reconstruction, techniques, risks.

Hs04 the use of a visual hand chart to aid in communication of hand injuries.

Friederich LJ, Page RD

Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital, Western Australia, Australia.

The hand is one of the most commonly injured parts of the body, however in a climate of increasingly reduced anatomical teaching, junior doctors are ill equipped to assess and describe hand injuries they encounter in their Emergency Department rotations. Hand and Plastic surgery registrars are often very busy and can find it time consuming to extract the information they require from junior doctors. Their workload can be managed significantly more effectively with clear, concise and accurate descriptions of hand injuries. This study was designed to assess the effect of a visual 'hand chart' on junior doctor's assessment and description of common hand injuries. The chart illustrates basic underlying anatomical structures and their relevant surface landmarks, together with the appropriate anatomical terms to describe them. Two groups of 25 junior doctors were tested. Group A were shown a set of 10 digital images of simple hand injuries and asked to transcribe what they would say to the on call hand surgeon. Group B were given the visual 'hand chart' and tested in a similar fashion with the same set of images. Group A was later retested with the 'hand chart' and a second set of 10 images. Simple demographic information was also collected from participants asking their year since graduation and any prior experience with hand surgery. A marking key was used to score participants answers and the results were analysed using the students t-test. Significant differences were found between the groups suggesting that the hand chart was a valuable aid in communication. It may thus prove useful in wider contexts, such as remote and rural medical stations.

Published 10 May 2007 in ANZ J Surg, 77: A34.
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