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Sunday, November 24, 2013

Toenail Fungus: Key Points of Treatment



Fungal toenails, or onychomycosis, can be unsightly and lead to ingrown toenails due to their increased thickness. In general, I like to stay away from medicine, oral anti-fungals, due to their liver side-effects. I try to stay in an environment-changing treatment arena. It can easily take up to a year to notice a considerable difference with any treatment, so many just leave it alone. For those of you willing to undertake the task of attacking this invader, here are your weapons.

What kills fungus? Air, vinegar, bleach, tea tree oil, and dryness are a few of the weapons we can easily combine to kill fungus. Fungus lives in the moist areas of our lives like shower stalls or shoe linings. Fungus lives in an anaerobic environment under the nail made more comfortable with fresh nail polish holding out the air.

One problem we have conquering toenail fungus is time. It takes over one year for the toenail to completely grow out twice. There is a general rule that it takes not one, but two of these growth spurts to push the unsightly debri of the killed fungus out from under the nail bed. Some smart person figured that out, but like anything else it is still a general rule with exceptions for longer and shorter time periods. So, we can successfully kill the fungus, but the nail still looks disfigured until all the debri is pushed out from under the toenail. Definitely, this is unfair!!

Let us again look at our weapons and how we will use them. They are:

1) AIR---get as much air under the nails by cutting the nails as short as possible monthly, gently cleaning the debri under the nails as long as there is no bleeding monthly, using an emery board weekly to file the top of the nails as thin as possible, and avoiding toe nail polish as much as possible (quickly remove when not needed).

2) VINEGAR---soak in white vinegar 30 minutes twice weekly using a 1 part warm water to 1 part white vinegar ratio (see another post on using gauze to create vinegar patches for nightly use especially for only 1 or 2 bad nails).

http://www.drblakeshealingsole.com/2011/11/onychomyosis-toe-nail-fungus.html

3) BLEACH---disinfect your shower weekly with bleach (for example, Lysol).

4) TEA TREE OIL---apply daily tea tree oil twenty minutes before you go to bed to each affected nail and surrounding soft tissue. It must dry well before getting under the sheets.

5) DRYNESS---air out your shoes weekly that you use regularly by removing the shoe inserts, applying foot powder under and on top of any insert, and rubbing at the top of the toe box where you imagine the toenails rub.

6) PATIENCE---you will need some of this to succeed, and you will!!


If you have very thick toenails when you are starting, ask a podiatrist about doing the Carmol 40 Urea Ointment occlusion treatment. This is discussed in another post, but is great at removing the nail without shots, and without bleeding. It is the bleeding that is bad in this process, because the blood is a candy store for the fungus. Many podiatrists recommend seeing them once every 1 or 2 months during the initial 6 months to thin the nails with their electrical grinders. It sounds gross, but it should not hurt at all. In fact, this whole process should be painless.

http://www.drblakeshealingsole.com/2011/11/onychomyosis-toe-nail-fungus.html

If you decide to use oral medicine, use pulsed Lamisil. It is the safest that I know where you take for only 7 days each month for 6 months. You still have to do the topical treatments as mentioned above. At present, the pulsed Lamisil does not need liver testing as part of the treatment, but your prescribing doctor may feel safer doing that. Golden Rule of Foot: Always error on the side of caution.
http://www.drblakeshealingsole.com/2011/12/toenail-fungus-news-about-lamisil.html

With the advent of Laser toe nail cleansing treatment, I would normally recommend this over oral medicines. If helps clean out the fungus debri faster than anything, but it is not a cure. 50% of patients think they were helped by it.

4 comments:

  1. Richard--

    Which over-the-counter topicals are best to deal with fungus? I saw you yesterday and we talked about removing the nail, but I know I'll need to continue to use a topical for a while.

    Thanks,

    Jim Burke (jburke56@earthlink.net)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Try to keep your feet out of shoes, put them on at the last minute before work, take them off at lunch, take them off while driving, things like that until the fungus if gone.EmoniNail Reviews

      Delete
  2. Jim, The ones I have used for years with some success are Fungoid Tincture, Tineacide, and Mycocide. Dr Rich Blake
    The nail procedure mentioned is called Carmol Urea Occlusion and it is done by chemically removing the nail, not surgically. More on that at a later post.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I've had pretty amazing success treating my toenail fungus with tea tree oil. Fixfungalnails.com

    ReplyDelete

Thank you very much for leaving a comment. Due to my time restraints, some comments may not be answered.I will answer questions that I feel will help the community as a whole.. I can only answer medical questions in a general form. No specific answers can be given. Please consult a podiatrist, therapist, orthopedist, or sports medicine physician in your area for specific questions.