How to Cut Your Fingernails and Toenails

How to Cut Your Fingernails and ToenailsNail cutting is quite a common occupation for every person. That’s why very few people think about how correctly it does it. Meanwhile, this procedure has a significant impact on the health of nail plates and the condition of the skin near them.

How to cut nails on hands

Before taking on the circumcision of nails, remove the varnish from them and wash your hands thoroughly with soap. After this, it is recommended to make a bath, it will soften the nail plates and greatly facilitate their haircut, especially steaming will be useful for people of age.

Then prepare the tool, it can be a nail scissors with straight ends or tweezers. They should be qualitative and sufficiently sharp, otherwise after their use the nail plates will begin to separate. To prevent infection, it is recommended to treat the selected tool with alcohol before work.

Try not to cut your nails very short. This increases the risk of infection and can lead to the fact that over time, the tips of your fingers will expand and become rough. The minimum length of the nail plate should be 0.5-1mm.

Nails, you can betray any desired shape, but keep in mind that the ideal is the one that repeats the contour of your fingers. In any case, the nail plates on the hands must necessarily round off. If this is not done, ingrown nail can occur in the skin.

To make the shape of the nail neat and maximally smooth cut it with only the tips of scissors, moving with small steps from the edge of the nail bed to the center. Do not try to trim the entire nail with just one closing of the blades, in this case, its damage and subsequent delamination is simply inevitable. In hard-to-reach places use tweezers. After circumcision, treat the nails with a nail file. Do this only in one direction, from the edge of the nail to the middle.

How to cut nails on feet

Circumcision of nails on the legs should be given special attention, because they are most predisposed to ingrown nail. This is facilitated by tight or uncomfortable shoes, fungal lesions and finger injuries.

Unlike nails on the hands, on the legs, the nails need to be cut evenly, avoiding any rounding. If the corners of the nail plates are constantly cut, this can lead to a change in the trajectory of their growth and ingrowth into the skin. It is also not recommended to cut them too deeply, let alone on their side.

Before you start to cut your nails, be sure to hold your feet in a warm bath with the addition of liquid soap, sea salt, soda, lemon juice or herbs. Then carefully wipe them with a towel and cut off the excess nails with sharp scissors. Do this from one end to the other in small translational movements. Remain the sharp edges in the edges slightly processed with a nail file.

How to cut an ingrown toenail

If you cannot avoid ingrown the nail, it is necessary as soon as possible, best when the first symptoms appear, begin to treat it. For this:

  • Place your feet for half an hour in a warm bath. This procedure will allow you to decontaminate the wound and wash the dirt.
  • Apply to an inflamed place antimicrobial ointment,
  • With a disinfected wooden stick or sharpened nail file, gently pry the tip of the ingrown nail, remove it to the surface and lightly handle with a nail file.
  • Slightly cut the edge of the nail vertically. After this, the nail plate, striving to consolidate, will begin to shrink to the middle and release the skin.
  • Treat the inflamed place with a green and try to put a small piece of sterile bandage under the nail.

Fully cut ingrown nail is not recommended, as this will lead to frequent relapses of the disease. To avoid this, it is necessary to give a nail plate of a branch, and, together with the corners.

Image credit: Hans