Cut Gloves – Save a Finger at Home or in the Field

Cut gloves aid against stupidity. Note the hand model…

Sutures Anyone?

Through most of my adult life, I’ve suffered through cut hands during hunting season. Seems like I’m the only one around who knows how to gut, skin, and dress an animal. That may be an exaggeration, but I’m always in the thick of it if not leading the charge. As a result of hurrying, I tend to cut myself…often.

Switch venues to home. I can’t begin to tell you how many times I’ve come home to see my wife’s hand wrapped in bandages. Don’t get me wrong, she does a lot of knife work. The mandolin slicer has resulted in an increase in both frequency and consequences. Ouch. How many ways can you cut yourself in the kitchen?

My Epiphany

At work we were experiencing quite a few injuries from slicing. Whether box cutter, pocket knives, or other sharp objects, it was getting out of hand (see what I did there?). Our company management took a zero-tolerance approach, radical in my opinion. They instituted a new policy that required gloves be used in the workplace at all times. Some departments took this to mean even while touring the plant. Furthermore, if you were cutting or working around sharp objects you had to wear cut gloves.

Now I’ll admit, I had purchased a pair of Rapala filet gloves to help protect my hands. What really got my attention though was the mandolin slicer and the company policy. Especially when my wife decided to give my mother-in-law a slicer, I knew we had to institute our own policy!

Cut Gloves

So what the heck are cut gloves? Simply, they are gloves made from cut-resistant materials and woven to give you varying levels of cut protection. They have different levels of protection, so do your homework. Amazon sells them pretty cheap. They look mostly like cotton gloves and really are pretty unobtrusive. You can get water-proofed versions or not.

Cut gloves won’t prevent every slicing event, but I’ve sure found they stop slicing events induced by my own hand.  You may only want to wear one on the hand that is in the line of fire. You may want to put them under or over another set of gloves temporarily. Either way, these guys are cheap insurance against losing a digit or spending time with the sawbones. Note: Please don’t think these will help much at the table saw or other power equipment. That is Darwin at work, but I believe in second chances.

Hunting

When hunting, I carry a cut glove and a latex or nitrile glove in my pocket. I’ve found that I can put the cut glove under the nitrile and I have a mostly waterproof and adventurous hand that can boldly go within the body cavity where no hand….wait, maybe that is TMI. Anyway, the nitrile helps me keep my hands a little less bloody and the cut glove seems to work. Body cavities are tight places when you have one hand wielding a knife and the other performing hold and pull duties. Bad stuff can happen. The cut glove fixes that.

When skinning an animal the nitrile goes away and the cut glove performs two functions. First, it still helps avoid cuts. Second, it allows me to grip the slimy skin and connective tissue more surely. The net result is I can move rather quickly through the chore without drawing my own blood. Oh, by the way, while I’m on the subject, consider buying a pair of game shears for small game. Avoid the knife and speed the work! Sort of like “save the cheerleader, save the world”, but I digress.

Around the House

Really? Do I have to go here? How many ways can you get cut doing chores at home? Lawn mowers, axes, box cutters, pocket knives, mandolin slicers, cheese graters, slicing and dicing, and how about those STUPID childproof packages that defy even the sharpest knives? My poor son stuck a knife nearly through his hand in one such incident. Aye carumba!

There are so many times you could use a cut glove to avoid misery and expense. I strongly suggest you buy pile of the things and keep them handy all the time.

Just Buy Some

On amazon, you can pick up a pair for around five bucks and they range from there to maybe $20 or more  . If you bought 8 pairs at $6.00, you would have for a mere $48, eight places to stash them so they are always close. Glove compartments, kitchen drawers, tackle boxes, lawn sheds, be creative. Your job becomes stashing these bad boys in all the areas you might get cut, so you have no excuse not to use them. Oh, by the way, the cheap units are ambidextrous like nitriles and latex. So you get 16 line-of-fire units with those 8 pairs. Please wear two gloves when the situation calls for it, you tightwad.

How much is an emergency room visit with stitches? How much would it be worth to avoid the pain and concern of knowing when not to go to the emergency room? Fifty bucks seems like some seriously cost-effective insurance against the inevitable “accidental” slicing. They say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Well, I’m a believer. If you don’t believe, for crap’s sake, just buy some and maybe those around you who are smarter will use them.

Closing

We now have cut gloves in our outdoor and hunting gear, kitchen, and few other hidey-holes. They have become synonymous with my best pocket knife when I’m gearing up to hunt. I keep them close always, and for two straight seasons, I’ve gone cut-free. While I’ve avoided the E.R. over the years, my left hand is usually a bandaged mess by the end of hunting seasons.

My family benefits from my company’s policy. Now we use cut gloves as part of our gear. Now our hands are in far less danger. If they only had gloves that could protect my thumb from that damned hammer…