Self-reported cold sensitivity in normal subjects and in patients with traumatic hand injuries or hand-arm vibration syndrome

Table 1 Characteristics of participants.

Parameter	Normal population n = 94	Traumatic hand injury n = 88	HAVS n = 30
Gender (male/female)	69/25	69/19	26/4
Age¹	48 (20-73)	46 (21-84)²	54 (24-66)²
Smoker Yes/No	15/79	24/66	5/25
Time since injury (months)¹	-	16 (8-28)	-
Years of vibration exposure¹	-	-	29 (4-46)
DASH score (0-100)^{3, 1}	-	22 (1-97)⁴	38 (5-74)⁴
HISS^{1, 5}	-	75 (5-305)	-
Vibration-induced white fingers (VWF)⁶	-	-
Stage 0			13*
1			7
2			7
3			3
4			0
Sensorineural symptoms⁶	-	-
Stage 0			3
1			9
2			10
3			8
Impaired vibrotactile sense⁷	-	-	26

¹ Median (range)
² Patients with HAVS were significantly older than patients with traumatic hand injuries (p = 0.01)
³ 0 = no disability, 100 = severest disability [22]
⁴ Patients with HAVS had significantly higher scores indicating more severe disability (p = 0.001)
⁵ Hand Injury Severity Score [20]
⁶ Stockholm Workshop scale
⁷ SI-index < 0.8 in at least one finger [35]
* 8 of 13 patients had cold sensitivity without blanching of skin (i.e. equal to 0.5 in a modified Stockholm Workshop scale, VWF)

ISSN: 1471-2474