Is your skin an organ?

Most people in the medical field consider the skin the largest organ in the body. An organ is sometimes
been defined as “a part of it the body that performs a specific function.”

The skin prevents us from becoming dehydrated, it is the major thermoregulator in the body, and
protects us from the in numerable micro organisms in our environment, (bacterial, fungal, and viral
alike.)

Anyone who has personally had, or or who has had a relative that sustained a large total body surface
burn knows exactly how important the skin is. The chances of survival depend upon the patient’s age
but in any age group, progressively decrease with each percentage body surface area over 10%. The
elderly can die with burns as low as 15% of the body surface area. However, on average, a young adult
with a 70% body surface area burn which years ago was about 100% mortality, now have about a 70%
mortality.

Can human fingernails puncture human skin?

Very many years ago, I was very junior and working with a very scary, very fierce, very senior member of
staff. She would put the fear of God into us all as she bellowed across the Department.

We were in the Resuscitation room with a young man who was a very frequent visitor to our
department, he was habitually drunk and unpleasant and frequently would feign unconsciousness.

On this occasion, the fierce one was attempting to rouse him by the application of painful stimulus. She
started to pinch the lobes of his ears with her fingers. We waited expectantly, and watched in horror as
her talon like finger nails punctured his earlobe - such that there was a crescent shaped wound from
front to back.

Once she had roused him, she wiped her hands on her uniform and wandered off, doubtless to smoke
20 cigarettes on her break.