Introduction: Patients can vary widely in their illness perceptions and subsequently, the manner in which they respond and adapt to health threats. A patient’s perception about his/her hand injury may explain their health behaviours such as adherence to post-operative therapy, coping, emotional response and eventual clinical outcome.

Aims: To examine illness beliefs in patients with hand injuries in the acute trauma setting.

Methods: The disability and severity of injury were determined using the DASH questionnaire and HISS score. The revised Illness Perception Questionnaire(IPQR) was used to explore the patient’s illness perception.

Results: Fifty seven patients were recruited. There was no correlation between the DASH and HISS scores, or their correlation with the different components of the IPQ-R scores. The cohort was optimistic about their treatment and duration of recovery. There was some evidence to suggest that patients with more severe injury were over-optimistic about recovery. Beliefs of negative consequences, chronic, cyclical duration and low illness coherence were linked with negative emotional response. Female patients and dominant hand injuries reported higher subjective disability.

Conclusions: The lack of correlations suggests that illness perceptions were not influenced by the severity of the injury. Patients in this cohort were optimistic about recovery, particularly in those with more severe injury (over-optimistic). These findings suggest that there could be a role for psychological intervention in hand injury. Longitudinal research is needed to evaluate illness beliefs in hand injury during the post-operative period.