Dicing ginger with honking big cleaver. Didn’t want to look/futz with it, immediately pinching it with bunch of paper towel. 1 hr later, just peaked, clean leak outline of slice/blood coming out.
Keep holding down and wait for clot for how long and if not clot get stitches? Better get stitches now? I have diabetes and even paper cuts take longer to heel than with other people.
I’m a fucking pianist and this sucks whichever.
my advice is to go to the ER and get it stitched up. or at least evaluated.
Cub Mistress, RN
Sound like the right thing to do.
Honking big cleaver sounds like overkill. Why not a chef’s knife?
You don’t want to lose touch in your fingertip, so stitches to pull it together properly would probably be a good idea. Get it looked at soonest.
Get stitches now, especially since you’re diabetic. I did the same thing to my pinkie finger, and by the time I went to Urgent Care a few days later, it was too late to stitch it. It eventually healed, but the finger pad is very sensitive, even making typing with that finger annoying. You never realize how many times you type the characters p, ; and ? until you injure your right pinkie. 
I had an employee at work do that. One of those cuts that, even hours later she was still putting pressure on it and it was still bleeding. I think it was a good 48 hours later before it had totally stopped.
I don’t want to tell you how long you should wait, but if you can find an open Urgent Care, I’d highly suggest that just due to cost (if that’s a factor). In her case she never did go, but she did find out later that even her own doctor’s office could have dealt with it right there in the office. I have to assume they’d either use glue or butterfly stitches.
Done it twice (once with a mandolin, another time with an xacto knife). Go get stitched to help increase the chances of better feeling.
The general rule of thumb is that any cut deeper than a pencil eraser (about 6mm) or that gapes open, either when still or with movement, or that doesn’t stop bleeding with 15 minutes of direct pressure should be evaluated by a doctor. It may or may not need stitches (or glue or butterfly bandages) but it likely needs a good cleaning out to prevent infection.
The general rule of thumb for diabetics is that you should err on the side of caution. If you’re not certain you don’t need it checked out, then you need it checked out.
I’ve given myself the same injury. Doctor recommended stitching it to stabilize the wound for clean healing. Fingertips are areas that get smooshed around a lot, no matter how careful you try to be.
I cut open that fleshy “crotch” by the thumb, with a sharp cat food lid. Kept it wrapped up until the next day, then went to the ER. They gave me 9 stitches and a lecture about waiting a day*. I’m diabetic too.
*The nurse asked me “Do you often have thoughts about harming yourself?” “Never.” “Do you have thoughts about harming others?” “Only politicians.” She said I made her day.
Help me out here. You’re worried about playing the piano, so the first thing you do is go to your computer and start typing? 
I’m pre-diabetic, so the doctor always cautions me about wounds and feet and whatever. But several years ago, I broke a glass while washing dishes. I wrapped it in a dish towel and went to my husband, who took one look, turned pale and said Im taking you to the urgent care. I said no, it’ll, be fine. Just give me another towel. Make it two.
Hell, got another towel? That was about the time I finally agreed to go. There is nerve damage in that thumb. I nicked the vessel and apparently a nerve.
I did a similar thing one time alone in the shop at night. I essentially cut a 9mm diameter flap on my left index finger about 3mm deep. It hurt like hell and bled like nuts. My brother, who’s a former ER doc lived about five minutes away and he came over and glued it back shut with some high-quality CA glue, essentially what the ER would have done. Stopped the bleeding but the best part was the pain stopped almost completely. Glue beats stitches for something like this, at least enough to ask about it. Hie thee to a doc, stat.
Stitches or superglue. I’ve cut myself on a meat slicer before and it was too thin to stitch so I ended up gluing it. I don’t know what I was doing wrong but I had to repeat it often. I’d always opt for stitches if called for to reduce the hassle of future bleeding events.
I think the trick was to cut off blood supply to the wound and then milk it dry of any blood present. We then get a nice blood-tight bond.
If you think it needs to be seen by a doctor, it does, especially if you are diabetic.
Yeah, I know people have already said that. I just said it again.
Go to the ER if you haven’t already. This really can’t wait, especially because you are also a pianist.
Thick scar tissue on the finger pad is something you’ll feel & be aware of every day - get the stitches or glue!
Another vote for seeking professional help and stitches or glue. And some small hope in my Doper heart that we see a follow-up thread saying “Well, the finger will be fine ----- but does anyone have good tips for getting bloodstains off my keyboard?” 
:eek: We have a meat slicer at work and I can’t tell you how often I see people doing things wrong. One of the most common things that they do wrong is slice without using the food weight (the part that metal thing that flips around and sits on top), either because what they’re slicing is to big and it doesn’t fit or it’s to small and they want to push it into the blade further. When it’s to small, well, duh. But even when the top of the food is well away from the blade, you get into a rhythm, you’re watching the food fall so you can deal with it with your left hand and of a sudden off go your finger tips. While they may ignore me, not a single one of my employees can say I’ve told them not to ever push the food down with their hand.
The other way it happens (less common than what I see going on, but a more common accident) is during cleaning. They’re using a brush similarly to this not so great picture. To exert some downward pressure, people tend to put a finger on the handle. Problem is, if it catches on something, your hand slides to the handle and if everthing is just wrong, it goes right into the blade.
To make matters even worse, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve come in to take a report the next day and they’ll always demonstrate it. Yeah, no, just tell me, don’t cut yourself again please.
My dad sliced the very tip (the pad) of his finger off (and picked it up and threw it out). That was probably 20 years ago. To this day he still has a bit of nerve damage. Not a lot, but he can still tap each of his finger tips and tell you which one it was. It was probably a good 10 years before that finger tip wasn’t numb anymore (or at least he stopped mentioning it. I don’t know how much throwing away the pad instead of having it stitched back on had to do with it though.
