Nail fungus (onychomycosis) is a massive disease that spreads easily in unhealthy conditions in public places and can also result from excessive foot sweating due to wearing poor quality shoes. If personal and general hygiene rules are not followed, onychomycosis quickly affects the toenails and then you have to go through long and expensive treatments that do not always guarantee complete eradication of the disease.
How to recognize a fungus
Sometimes a person does not attach importance to the fact that the color and structure of the nail has changed, become fragile, or vice versa, thick and hard. In addition, the primary symptoms of onychomycosis are not obvious, although treatment at this stage may still help resolve the problem quickly.
Treatment should be started immediately if the following symptoms are observed:
- the appearance of striking streaks, dots, or whitish spots on the nails;
- loss of natural light on the nail and the formation of cloudy, whitish or brownish areas;
- delamination of the nail plate;
- inflammation of the skin near the sick nails.
Characteristic signs of onychomycosis are itching, burning, dryness and peeling. If at least two or three of these signs are found, it indicates that it is time to start treatment.
Effective traditional medicine
A variety of tools are used to treat nail fungi - from drugs and chemicals sold freely in pharmacies to herbs. To achieve a positive result, you often need to try different methods or combine more. The most important thing with such a treatment is not to stop or achieve the course, as untreated onychomycosis manifests itself in relapses and leads to the loss of new, healthy nails.
Available drugs and cures
Some of the makeshift tools found in every home closet or first aid kit are effective antifungal agents. These treatments include ordinary iodine, which, by rubbing it constantly into the affected nail, can quickly achieve complete cure of the disease, but only in the first stages of onychomycosis.
The usual treatment with iodine involves the daily use of a 5% solution, which should be rubbed into the nail twice a day (in the morning and before going to bed) for a month. After a few weeks of treatment, the patient may feel pain in the skin around the nail, but this is not a chemical burn, but a sign of the start of the healing process.
An alternative to iodine is a strong solution of potassium permanganate. This treatment, diluted 1: 1 with water, is rubbed into the patient's nails with the same frequency, and the better change is already visible after the first week.
Hydrogen peroxide is considered a more benign agent: cotton swabs soaked in this agent should be applied to sore nails so that such a compress can be easily attached by putting on socks. You should change your disc twice a day, provided you wear shoes at all times (such as at work). This softens the affected nails and then the patient segments and areas are easily removed.
Soda and propolis are popular antifungals among the people and can be used in many ways.
- Soda. Baking soda to a bowl of hot water is added to three liters of boiling water in a tablespoon ratio. After the feet have been soaked in such a liquid for thirty minutes, the nails affected by onychomycosis should be lubricated with celandine essential oil after the feet have been wiped dry. It is applied until complete healing.
- Propolis. To one hundred grams of alcohol add 10 grams of propolis, the product should be filled as close as possible under the affected nails after steaming. The tool can also be applied to the surface of the patient's nails and then socks or a tight bandage should be placed on the foot. Such a bandage can only be replaced after one day. It is used until onychomycosis is completely cured.
- 20% alcoholic propolis solution. Apply the product to the affected areas of the nail daily. It was used for two weeks.
These funds usually yield results within 7-10 days of the start of the course. If these methods do not work, you should try other recipes.
Herbal treatment
Herbs are the safest natural ingredients in some recipes to help the nail fungus heal quickly. The golden mustache is most often used as such a natural medicine. About 50 segments of the plant should be cut off and adhered to 500 ml of vodka. One week later, the finished infusion is diluted 1: 3 with water and applied to the patient's nails twice or thrice daily until the fungus has completely disappeared.
Ordinary purple flowers are also antifungal if properly prepared. It is enough to pour 10 grams of freshly picked flowers of this plant with a hundred grams of pure alcohol and let it stand for two weeks - and the product is ready. It should be applied in the same way as the previous one.
An interesting method that involves internal rather than external use. To make such a cure, you need to take ten grams of the following plants:
- blackberry leaves;
- oak bark;
- horsetail;
- marigold flowers;
- iron grass.
Pour a mixture of these herbs into a glass of boiling water and simmer for fifteen minutes. The medicine should be taken 4 tablespoons 4 times a day.
Other folk remedies
You can use birch tar for the treatment, which you can now buy at any pharmacy. This tool is used as follows:
- In the evening, steam the legs well and rub them with soap for 15-20 minutes.
- Softened nails should be cut short, paying particular attention to removing the exfoliated areas of the patient.
- The nails are thickly smeared with birch tar, which should be left to stand for one and a half to two hours.
- After this time, the feet can be wiped off the tar and washed thoroughly, the procedure being repeated once a week until the nails have healed.
Kombucha is effective against onychomycosis. This device is used for compresses: a tight bandage, gauze or a piece of clothing is impregnated with kombucha, which is placed on the sore nail.
You will need three liters of tea and a glass of sugar to make kombucha. The tea is poured into a three-liter bottle and left in a warm place for a few days: during this time, a film forms on the surface of the liquid that looks like ordinary mold. Sugar is then added to the pot, which accelerates the growth process of the kombucha. It usually takes no more than a month and a half to mature.
The entire foot is then rewound with polyethylene: this is another factor that deprives the fungus of access to oxygen, which speeds up the process of exterminating the parasite. Warm socks should be put on the polyethylene and you can go to bed in this form, removing the compress in the morning. The procedure is repeated daily until complete recovery.
If the previous methods did not work, try using essential oils. In fact, these inexpensive drugs are almost exact analogues of expensive antifungal agents, so in terms of their properties and effectiveness, essential drugs are close to any pharmacy antifungal agent.
The advantage of essential oils is that they have a complex effect, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, cleansing and regenerating effect, so healing is fast and painless. Unlike many antifungal creams and gels that completely destroy the affected nail plate, essential oils cleanse the affected areas.
You can use such products in various forms, the entire essential oil tank is used to make the product:
- As a compress: the essential oil should be heated to a temperature of 30 degrees in a water bath and then the viscosity should be diluted with a few tablespoons of water. Swabs or clothing are impregnated with such oil, which is attached to the patient’s nails for up to an hour. After removing the compress, it can be seen that the affected part of the nail has peeled off, but the main part of the cleaned one has remained (later covered with a new protective layer).
- For baths: pour three liters of hot water into a pool and add ten drops of essential oil. It is enough to keep the feet in a pool for 20-30 minutes, then wipe dry and wrap them in a thick towel for a while.
- As an ointment: apply any amount of essential oil to pre-steamed sick nails. After that, the oil does not need to be removed, an amount should be applied that is completely absorbed into the nail plate (this is empirically revealed).
You can use any essential oil to taste:
- tea tree oil;
- ylang-ylang;
- rosemary oil;
- anise oil;
- bitter orange oil;
- basil oil;
- bergamot oil;
- immortelle oil;
- vetiver oil and any other.
The only contraindication in this case may be an allergy to the ingredients of a certain type of oil.
Such recipes are used until complete healing.
Fungus is a dangerous and common disease that requires immediate treatment. In the absence of appropriate measures, such a disease can become a chronic form that is sometimes completely impossible to get rid of. Experts often recommend that you stop using folk remedies, but statistics show that onychomycosis is most often cured with traditional medicine, but you need to choose the right prescription for you to achieve a positive effect.