Paper cuts, they are soooooo small yet they cause soooo much discomfort for their size. Anyone know why?
Paper cuts are a lot like glass cuts, in that the cut is very smooth. When you get cut by other things, there are little bits of skin just kinda hanging out that a scab can start forming from. But in the event that a cut is smooth, there’s no good way to start a scab, and so it takes longer to form. The longer a cut is open, the more likely it is to get infected.
That doesn’t explain why they hurt so much at first, though. And you’re right–paper cuts are about as bad as it gets.
Because they are generally on the finger tips which are just jammed full of nerve endings. Any kind of cut on the finger tip is very painful.
Paper has some material in it, which irritates the wound.
Uh Ultrafilter heres your sign. Clean cuts generally heal much FASTER than ragged ones since the cut edges can be more easily bandaged or sutured together resulting in less scar tissue and or scabbing forming. by minimizing the exposed surface area, it becomes less likely that an infection will take hold.
To the OP you generally end up with paper cuts in places with a higher density of nerves (usually fingers) so even though its just a tiny cut, it hits lots of nerves.
For example I punch you twice, with exactly the same amount of force, one in the middle of your chest, the other to your nose. Which will hurt more? The nose, because your face, like your hands has a higher density of nerve endings per square cm.
That only applies if you bandage or suture, correct?
Right idea, bad example. Hit someone square in the middle of the chest and you’ve got them in the solar plex.
I’m sitting here with my wife/fellow Doper Cyn who is a working Registered Nurse. No clean cuts will heal faster in general, not just with medical closure procedures.
Um off to Anatomy with you… Solar plexus is well below what anyone would call “the middle of your chest.”
Whenever I get a papercut, I try to get it to bleed out a bit by squeezing the area around the cut to clean it. If it doesn’t bleed, I’ll put lemon juice on it to clean it out (if there isn’t any alcohol around), and then I seal it with crazy glue! Works for me!
the cut healing to surface area relationship seems pretty intuitive… the smaller the surface area of the wound… the quicker the healing time, i would imagine. paper cuts have virtually no surface area, since they are genreally just slices… Whereas something like a deep scrape (like the one i’ve had on my knee for past three weeks) tends to heal slowly, lot more skin to regenerate.
and its been my experience that, mediacted or not, they tend to heal pretty quickly.
as for the pain, i think the location is part of it, but also they tend to be kida deep, a lot of the time. Deceptively so. they cut thru a lot of nerve endings on the way down…
and the location thing works against you in two ways… 1 fingers have more nerve endings, and 2 they come into direct contact with other things that apply pressure more often than say, your forearm, or the square of your back. So every time you go into your pocket for change, or type, etc… you irritate the would and it hurts again…
like damn hangnails hat those too… ouch
Why do paper cuts hurt so much? I think it is due to 2 main reasons.
First, the location of paper cuts are normally in very sensitive parts of the body such as the hands(this is already mentioned is other replies).
Secondly, paper is made of many tiny fibers. When the edge of the paper slides along the flesh these fibers will be thrust in many different directions. There by increasing the area of damage to far greater area then that which is visible. This will trigger many more nerve endings to send pain signals then would be typical in a laceration of its size.
I enter exhibit A into evidence.
http://www.mos.org/sln/sem/staple.gif
This is a staple going through paper, note the dagger-like fibers.
So being cut by paper is a lot like using a wooden slide naked.
A couple people here have mentioned that paper cuts generally appear on sensitive spots, such as fingers. I want to know what sensitive spots you people are getting paper cuts in besides your fingers. Ouch!
This one time, in paper camp…
Actually, paper cuts aren’t smooth at all. The edge of the paper is like a microscopic saw, causing jagged edges. The jaggedness is microscopic, so you don’t notice it.
This, plus the additional nerve endings, and the various substances in the paper (including acid, if it’s not book paper) add up to more pain.
I always thought it was something to do with paper cuts exposing nerves/nerve endings, as opposed to grazes and such which would generally destroy a lot of them.
Thinking about paper cuts makes me wince: Anybody see ‘Swimming with Sharks’?
I recently gave myself (accidentally) a cut on the finger with my Henckels carving knife, recently sharpened. Although it looked just like a paper cut, after the initial pain (which really wasn’t much), it didn’t hurt at all. So I’m thinking there’s something to either the roughness of paper, or the fibers that get embedded under the skin.
Doctors are now using medical glue to close some wounds. I don’t know if it’s really crazy glue, or some other formulation…but it’s got to be less itchy than stitches!
I’m diabetic, and must take blood samples from my fingertips. I’ve tried taking a sample from my arm with the same size of lancet, and I’ve found that I barely feel the prick on my forearm, but I always feel the stab on my finger. So, I’d say that it’s definitely the location of the paper cut that helps determine the ouch! factor.
I stand corrected, then.
**
Having taken a good solid punch in the middle of my chest, I can assure there’s some major nerve center there. Two questions, then: 1) Where is the solar plexus? 2) What’s the nerve center in the middle of the chest?
I once cut my fingertip nearly to the bone with a scalpel. It hardly hurt a bit. I’d happily do it again to avoid a papercut in the same place.
I think the added pain is the jaggedness of the cut - more surface area exposed, and nerve endings being dragged as they’re gut, rather than cleanly severed.
Lemon juice?!??! SandWriter, you’re a sick puppy.
Now imagine… Death of a Thousand Paper Cuts. :eek:
Tongue, licking envelopes. ultrafilter will hit ya in detail when I get back sunday…off to Tahoe…
I just got three paper cuts in about three days. I’ve been throwing out files and stuff at work. I think they hurt so much because you get them from such an unassuming weapon: paper. You are pissed that you managed to get hurt by the annual report of XYZ company and not by the 20 inch blade of some Rambo-esque maniac. You figure you haven’t got anything against the latter, but damn it, you should be able to take the former.
Also, it usually hurts so much because you are doing something you hate, like throwing out files and stuff at work for the past three days.
Ouch… I just hit the key with one of my wounded fingers.
I also have a therory that back in the early 90s when Michael Jackson was sporting athletic tape on his finger tips he was suffering from severe paper-cutitis.
That’s what I think, anyway.