Nail Diseases

The skin is the largest organ of the body with a larger surface area than any other organ, healthy skin means beauty and to be beautiful and healthy, people and especially women spend money and hours of their time to achieve what they desire. The skin and its components such as hair and nails are of special importance, to have beautiful and healthy nails it is necessary to know some of the most common nail diseases, and to know how to treat them.

The nail is about 0.5-0.7 mm thick. It is made up of 100-150 layers. The thickness of the nail increases from childhood 600 um to 900 um in adulthood and to 1100 um in old age.

The nail grows 0.9 mm per week. Growth also depends on the seasons and age. The nail of the middle finger grows faster than the others and the nails of the dominant hand grow faster than those of the other hand. The nail transmits sunlight in UVA waves 1-3% and UVB 5-10%, this amount of light is sufficient to cause photo onycholysis, (nail damage.)

The most common nail pathologies.

Onychoshisis, nail dehydration

Often, the front part of the nail separates into several horizontal layers, called Onychoshisis. The main cause is drying, the loss of the nail's moisture, which comes as a result of frequent hand washing. In this case, the nail loses water and separates into layers.

The excessive use of chemical nail cleaners (such as acetone) aggravates the condition. The therapy is the use of moisturizing creams containing urea, several times a day and after every hand wash. This has been seen to lead to improvement.

Onycholysis

Onycholysis is the painful separation of the nail from its bed. Minor repeated trauma can be the cause of it. The most common clinical appearance is semicircular onycholysis. It occurs when the nail is exposed to frequent hand washing and keeping them in water for a long time such as in the case of dishwashers, cooks, housewives, etc. The free part of the nail allows the entry of water inside it through the formed channels and thus the separation of the nail from its bed is realized.

The treatment here too is the use of moisturizing creams and the elimination of repeated nail trauma such as indiscriminate hand washing or keeping them in water for a long time, in the case when this pathology has come from mycotic infections, the mycotic infection must be treated for this refer to your dermatologist.

Nail infection with pseudomonas

When the color of the nail changes from normal, the changes that have brought this color disorder can be on its surface, inside it, or beneath it. The most common color change occurs from nail infection with pseudomonas aeruginosa, a bacterium that after infection gives the nail a green color, and often occurs in people who use water a lot and keep their hands in water like dishwashers, bartenders, cooks, etc.

Treatment in this case after accurate diagnosis is keeping the diseased nails in acetic acid (vinegar) for 5 minutes a day for 2 consecutive weeks and the use of antibiotic ointments.

One of the most common nail infections are fungal infections. Initially, the fungal infection only affects one nail and then spreads to all other nails.

Nail with fungal infection.

More often, fungal infection of the nails comes from fungal infection of the skin around the nail. Early treatment of the skin fungus prevents the nail fungus which is a challenge to be treated due to the long duration of antifungal medications that need to be used and their side effects due to this long use.

Nail hematoma.

Continuous damage to the surface of the nails towards the nail bed causes subungual hemorrhage (under the nail) or nail hematoma. Subungual hematoma of the nail initially is red and then the color changes to blue and then to black. It is often accompanied by swelling of the damaged finger, redness, and pain. If the patient does not know what caused the coloring of his nail and this hematoma has been present for a while then it needs to be differentiated from malignant melanoma.

Nail eczema

Drilling the nail plate with a hot sterile needle leads to a reduction of pain and pressure.

Chronic eczema of the hands and feet can lead to nail damage. The more often and faster the cuticle and lateral edges of the nails are damaged, this leads to cracking, breaking, and thickening of the nails. Some authors have also called this nail eczema. The faster and better the eczema is treated with cortisone-based ointments, the faster the nails will begin to improve.

As for the use of manicures or artificial nails (with gel), their use should not be indiscriminate, repeated often, after every such application it is necessary to continuously use moisturizing creams and gel creams containing vitamins and hyaluronic acid that are applied to the nail surface, after removing artificial nails it is necessary to give our nails time for regeneration before making another application with gel. Creams with hyaluronic acid are the best for nail regeneration.