I hope you survived "avocado hand" summer! Did you know that, according to research, the most popular months to slice your hand open while cutting an avocado are April through July? In a recent article, The Independent explains what "avocado hand" is:
According to research, thousands of people slice their hands and fingers annually while cutting avocados primarily between April and July. Surgeons have seen these injuries so often that they have begun to call them "avocado hand" injuries, due to the injury typically occurring while cutting an avocado.
People lose their grip on the avocado and accidentally slice their palms or fingers, doctors have warned. When this happens, there's a high likelihood of people accidentally severing their nerves or tendons. However, people also tend to stab themselves in the hand as they attempt to use the knife tip to remove the avocado pit.
These injuries have increased over time in the United States, as America's love affair with avocados has grown over the last twenty years. Research has also shed light on just who is suffering from "avocado hand." In an article published in the American Journal of Emergency Medicine in 2020, researchers Kevin X. Farley and colleagues described and quantified avocado-knife-related injuries that required emergency department visits. Farley and colleagues explain that they searched the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System for avocado-related knife injuries that occurred between 1998 and 2017. They found that women comprised the vast majority (80%) of such injuries, and more specifically, that women between the ages of 23 to 29 made up more than a third of all cases. What demographic was least likely to be injured? Males under the age of 17 (at .9%). Here are their full findings:
There were an estimated 50,413 (95% Confidence Interval: 46,333–54,492) avocado-related knife injuries from 1998 to 2017. The incidence of avocado-related knife injuries increased over this time period (1998–2002 = 3143; 2013–2017 = 27,059). This increase correlated closely with a rise in avocado consumption in the U.S. (Pearson's Correlation: 0.934, p < 0.001) Women comprised 80.1% of injuries. The most common demographic injured were 23 to 39-year old females (32.7%), while the least common was males under the age of 17 (0.9%). Most ED presentations occurred on Saturdays (15.9%) or Sundays (19.9%) and the majority occurred during the months of April through July (45.6%). Injuries were much more common on the left (and likely non-dominant) hand.
I beg you, folks, stop slicing your hands open while prepping avocados! Here's how I avoid avocado injuries: I use a butter knife to slice the avocado in half, and then scoop out the flesh with a spoon. Does this method create the same beautiful thin slices that a sharp knife does? No. But it lowers my risk of avocado-related knife injuries to pretty much zero, so I'll deal with not-so-pretty avocado blobs!
