The hand is one of the most complicated and most taken-for-granted parts of the body. Try going an hour with your hand tied up in a sling and see just how much you depend on it.
Twenty-seven bones are packed into that small space. In fact, one quarter of all the bones in your body are in your hands. (Add your feet and it's half the bones in your body.) Those small bones are linked together with ligaments, tendons, nerves and muscles whose engineering should make us marvel anew every time we pick up a pen.
So it's surprising that we treat these delicate instruments so carelessly. And it's lucky that, when we do, there are skilled and inventive therapists who can mitigate the damage.
Jim Radloff of Eau Claire, Wis., learned how quickly our lives can take a turn on a late-winter day a year ago. He was running the snow blower and when it became jammed with slush he did what he always did: He turned the motor to neutral, watched as the blades stopped turning, and reached in to clear the blades.
He heard a click, the motor engaged, and in an instant he had lost the ends of three fingers on his right hand.
"Obviously, this was the dumbest thing I've ever done," he admits. Jim was one of about 6,000 people who injure themselves with a snow blower every winter. A thousand of those, like Jim, lose fingers or hands.
Because the hand is so delicately engineered, every injury is unique. Physical therapists often need to get creative.
Jim's therapist at the Mayo Clinic invented a strap to restore strength to his knuckles. Jim labeled it "the torture tool."
But it worked. Just a year after his injury, Jim had enough use of his right hand that he could once again play the piano, something he has done since childhood.
Jim has given away his snow blower, but he keeps the mangled glove he was wearing as a reminder of how quickly our lives can take a turn.
Last Updated: 3/15/2013