I use cut gloves with dorsal impact protection whenever I'm working around cassettes/freewheels or chainsets, particularly pedals (and don't forget to put the chain on the big chainring!)



They aren't that expensive (<$20), the cost savings from avoiding an ER visit more than makes up for the cost, and they double as downhill gloves!

I use the ER visit in jest, but the last shop I worked at got these for all the mechanics after one skinned the back of his hand removing a pedal. Being a typical mechanic he wiped it off, threw on a band-aid and kept going. 3 days later his hand was swollen to about 2x times its normal size, bright red, and the arm was starting to get inflamed. Yup, he got infected from the cut, ended up in the hospital after he went sepsis. They guy was a shell of his former self the next time I saw him, and had some long-term hand problems.

The shop owner stepped up and somehow got the shop's insurance to cover the hospitalization, and started taking this stuff seriously. Cut gloves, dumping all the chain whips and replacing them with proper cassette vises and Pedro's Vise Wipes were just some of the things they put in place. They even got impact wrenches for pedal removal. The shop owner had 3 stores but he said the cost to implement the changes in all the shops was less than $5k, far less than what the injury was going to cost him. A little protection goes a long ways.