Get yourself a catfish de-hooker. Basically its a piece of 1/4 roundbar bent with a small hook on the end. You hold your line, take the hook end of the de-hooker and flip the fish over. You dont have to touch the fish. It works with any fish not just catfish, when I was young before they had size limits on reds we would use it on them and speckled and white trout as well. You can buy the de-hookers at academy..... link
http://www.academy.com/webapp/wcs/st...atfish&Ntk=All