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Over a two year period from 1987-1989 all fishing-related injuries treated in the Emergency Room at Bornholm's central hospital in Rønne and at some general practices were registered prospectively. One hundred injuries were registered altogether. Accidents occurring in connection with putting out and recovering apparatus constituted respectively 14% and 36%. Working with the trawler scoop was responsible for 18% of the accidents and was the most common direct cause, followed by work with winches which constituted 11%. Falls made up almost a quarter of the accidents. Finger injuries constituted 33%, and hand and wrist injuries 17%. Trawler scoop injuries most commonly involved the fingers and hands and fish-cleaning injuries the hands, wrists and fingers. Prophylactic efforts concerning safety in work with trawler scoops, winches and steering systems should be made.

This study reports the causes, characteristics and treatment of injuries to the hand and wrist presented to five accident and emergency departments in a two-year survey of 13% of the Danish population. The rate of injury to the hand or wrist was 28.6% of all injuries, or 3545 per 100,000 inhabitants per year. Thirty-four percent of the accidents were domestic, 35% were leisure accidents, 26% were occupational and 5% were traffic accidents. Only 2% of the patients were admitted to hospital for further treatment or observation and 13% were referred to a hospital as out-patients. The most frequent causes for admission were fractures (42%), tendon lesions (29%) and wounds (12%).

Epidemiological data on wrist injuries in a population can be used for planning by applying them to criteria of care and thus deriving estimates of needs for care according to currently desirable standards. In a one-year study all patients 15 years or older with acute wrist trauma and treated at the emergency room were examined according to an algorithm until a diagnosis was established. The overall incidence of wrist trauma was 69 per 10,000 inhabitants per year. Incidence of wrist trauma requiring radiographic examination was 58 per 10,000 per year. The incidence of fractures of the distal radius was 27 per 10,000 per year (males, 16 per 10,000, females, 37 per 10,000 per year). In order to evaluate the completeness (defined as the proportion of patients with wrist injuries seen at the emergency room out of all patients with wrist injuries in the catchment area) of the hospital based data an analysis was performed using data from a population based study. A completeness rate of 0.56 (95% confidence interval 0.31-0.78) was found. A radiographic examination had been performed in all patients reporting a fracture, justifying the use of fractures as an incidence measure when comparing groups of patients with a wrist trauma.