Why is my big toe yellow
How to CURE Yellow Toenail Fungus & Toe Fungus [Remedies & Treatment]
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(orchestral music)
- This is Biernacki
I'm gonna show you the top 20 ways
to stop your yellow, ugly toenails from growing back.
Most of these can be done without seeing a doctor,
although always see a doctor
because we are Fun Guys.
(soft music)
So how did you get your yellow fungal toenail?
Did you jam it?
Did you break it off?
Is it on all your toenails?
Is it just on your big toenails?
We usually see people get it on their big toenails
and their fifth toenails.
This is usually because the shoes are squeezing it
and it's breaking the nail off,
but a lot of people get it on all the toenails.
So let us know.
We're interested to hear fungal toenails can be brown.
They can be green.
They could be yellow.
There's some different causes,
but realistically there's bacteria and fungus everywhere.
When your nail comes loose and starts getting detached
and there's thick callus under the nail,
you then start getting fungus and bacteria under the nail.
It starts getting worse.
This can become yellow, crumbling,
ragged coming off your toenail.
It can cause pain.
If it's black underneath the nail,
that's dry blood from your nail, ripping off even further.
Diabetic patients, patients with health conditions,
this can lead to toe infections, hospitalizations
that doesn't happen to most people,
but if you have smoking, blood flow problems, diabetes,
we see this 10 times a week minimum in our clinic.
It's a very dangerous thing.
So not only is this cosmetic,
but if you're older and more susceptible,
definitely, definitely make sure
you take care of your fungal toenails.
They're not just the cosmetic problem.
This can cause your toenail
to be permanently ugly, lower self esteem.
People are afraid to wear sandals
like in clinic people come in ashamed.
Even when they're not that bad,
it really hurts your self esteem.
So that's why these top 20 tips
and tricks are the important things
that you should be doing.
So, first thing is fix your risk factors.
If you're a smoker,
if you're an uncontrolled diabetic,
if you have health issues,
make sure you see your doctor and take care of that.
Even the disclaimer should be everything you do here.
Check with your doctor because you wanna be safe.
You don't wanna just trust the video,
but you wanna check out athlete's foot.
If you have athlete's foot.
Check these links to our athlete's foot videos
because athlete's foot can infect your nails.
So make sure to get rid of that first.
Risk factors are
previous nail injuries, having diabetes, having smoked
in the past, bad shoes, older, poor health.
little kids generally don't get fungal toenails
cause they're really healthy
unless they're jamming and breaking their toenail.
So starting with tip number one.
Tip number one is you can see a podiatrist
and you can get nail surgery.
So there's videos all over the place.
So we even have our own videos,
but you wanna start with something safer first
before removing your complete toenail.
You wanna try some easier stuff.
So number two is medications.
There's things like itraconazole, Lamisil
but these can be harmful medications
that you have to take for a very long time.
We'd prefer you to start with something safer,
even safer than oral antifungals are topical antifungals.
So your podiatrist can prescribe a lot of great things.
So there is Ciclopirox.
There is other Lamisil versions.
There's stuff you can paint on your nails.
These are great prescription creams,
but do you even really need to start with that?
That probably shouldn't
even be your first line of targeting.
Here's the top 20 practical tips and tricks.
Number one, wash your hands,
wash your feet, get rid of the debris.
Get rid of the toenail fungus.
If you're dirty, if you have long toenails,
you've gotta clean that up.
The more bad sweat, fungus
and debris gets under there daily,
the more bad stuff you're bringing under there.
So that's number one.
Number two is take a nail clipper
and go straight across.
So don't get down into the edges and the corners.
You're gonna cut yourself.
You're gonna break off your nail corner.
As a podiatrist, I get to cheat
and I get to break the rule and do it.
Cause people are always like,
"Hey, you told me to cut straight across."
"Hey, we have the luxury of doing this a thousand times,"
but people usually damage and cut too far into the corner.
And this creates a place for the fungus to get in.
And this is where the bacteria get in.
So cut straight across.
That's the rule.
Number three, file the toenail.
So simple nail file.
Get over there and filed down the toenails,
both in height of the toenail
and in length of the toenail.
That can be very beneficial.
Number four, disinfect your nail files and your clipper.
Make sure they're not just sitting there.
People always kind of tell horror stories
of nail salons that do this.
They're generally pretty good,
but you wanna disinfect these things.
You wanna clean them after using it.
Cause if you clip a dirty toenail,
then your brother, or sister
or your mom or dad comes in and uses it.
They're gonna get fungus.
I've already kind of mentioned,
but don't share them.
So not only do you wanna disinfect them,
but you don't wanna share them.
So here's an old shoe.
This is number six.
You wanna get some Lysol or antifungal spray.
You don't want old shoes
that are like three years old covered in sweat.
If you're suffering from fungus,
realistically, get a new shoe or spray it down or wash it.
There's plenty of disinfectants.
You don't need anything crazy,
but spray down the shoe, spray down your socks,
make sure you're washing your socks every single day.
Make sure you're switching them.
"Hey, would you go to a date
for the first time wearing an old gym sock
that you just wore from a basketball game?
You wouldn't, because it's smells
because it has fungus and bacteria on it.
The more you wear that on your foot,
the more you're gonna get athlete's foot.
The more you're gonna get nail problems.
That's a huge pitfall for people.
Number eight, look at all the mesh here.
You wanna get breathable shoes.
So people are less likely to get toenail fungus
and nail problems in the summer necessarily
because it's more, flip-flops less socks.
People are in pools with chlorine
their feet are getting cleaned.
So I see that a lot less likely unless you catch
it from a pool, that's a different story.
But if you're constantly sweating,
if you're wearing work shoes,
if you're not getting a chance to change your socks
and your shoes, aren't breathing,
you're building up sweat.
You're getting not only toenail fungus but athlete's foot
because the fungus can live on the sweat, the dry skin,
You wanna change your socks.
You wanna change your shoes regularly
and you wanna keep them clean
and you wanna make sure they're breathable.
Breathable socks so look at
I'm wearing this one right now.
So you could see it's been worn all day.
It's been a long workday,
but get some socks that breathe.
You wanna get that sweat out of there
and socks are dirt cheap now.
I'm watching a movie on Netflix
where a guy time traveled from the past
and he was shocked that people have 30 socks
in their cupboard.
They're dirt cheap, buy more socks.
Use a new pair every day and then keep them washed.
Don't re wear socks.
If you have toenail fungus.
Onto number 10, go to a good nail salon.
Most nail salons are good now.
They do a great job,
but make sure they're sterilizing their equipment.
Make sure everything's clean.
It's either peel packs
or they come out of antiseptic solution.
Both are pretty good, study show
they're pretty good.
So either it's in the solution
or a fresh pack, a peel pack every time,
make sure, nobody really gets away doing the shady stuff
anymore with reviews and online stuff now,
but just make sure that's happening.
And here's the big one.
Don't go to a nail salon,
if you have diabetes,
if you're an older person,
if you have health conditions
and nail salons are really good about this.
If you have fungus,
if you have health issues,
it's not a cosmetic problem.
You probably should see a podiatrist at that point
because this is where a nail salon
and a podiatrist differs are,
if you have health conditions, blood flow problems,
diabetes, anything along those lines,
you can't reach your toes.
This is a medical condition.
Most insurances cover this stuff.
That's the difference.
It's, a medical problem at a certain point.
It's not just a cosmetic problem
because like I mentioned,
10 patients a week I see in the hospital
with toenail infection, cellulitis, serious issues.
If you go swimming at a pool, get yourself a sandal.
So this is a pair of Birkenstocks.
Just get something like that.
I have some great guides on my favorite sandals
and slippers down in our recommended shoe guides
down in the links,
but get yourself a good pair of sandals
and slippers in community showers, baths, community pools,
especially now that the summer's coming to an end.
These are things you want to start wearing.
Nail polish so nail polish, here's what usually happens.
If you put on nail polish,
it's usually not bad by itself,
but the nail polish remover,
what it does especially Acetone based nail polish removers.
What happens with these is
they really dehydrate the surface of your toenail.
So stop that dehydration.
What will happen with that is it will cause cracks
in your toenail to turn flaky and white.
Fungus and bacteria love that,
because that's no longer getting blood flow.
So down in our show notes,
we have safe polish removers that work really well,
non-acetone base.
They won't dehydrate your toenails.
So if you're using nail polish,
it's not the worst thing in the world,
but make sure you're hydrating
and moisturizing your toenail.
This brings us to the next point is
keep your nails moisturized things
like Burt's Beeswax, different wax.
Even when you go to bed at night, using some Vaseline
to keep your nails moisturized, get that moisture going.
That really works well against dry toenails,
dry loose toenails, dry skin around your toenails
between clipping and filing and moisturizing.
There's not much room for the fungus to live.
This is a big one, shoes and orthotics.
So what happens is most patients that I see,
especially older patients,
they wear tight shoes.
Look at the front of these shoes right here.
One is more narrow in the front and one is more wide.
Not only that, but look at this is mesh in the front.
As I'm pushing right there, the mesh isn't pushing
on the toenails.
For most people
if you're getting into your big toe and your fifth toe,
that means your shoe is squishing your toenails.
So if it's only on your big toe or your fifth toe,
it's your shoe, that's probably causing it.
It's causing your toenail to lift.
So not only is this a breathable shoe
with a breathable sock,
but it's not pushing against your toenail
and it's not loosening your nail.
If the nails not loosened,
then you can't really get fungus
because your blood's flowing
and it's killing any bacteria or fungus.
But if the nails loose,
if you have dry skin,
if you have callus,
that's where the fungus loves
to live and attack your skin.
And not only that, but with a good orthotic.
So a good orthotic watch this right here.
When I put my bone model on the orthotic,
it's pretty stable.
See how the toes aren't moving.
But if I'm walking barefoot with an unsupported shoes,
look at how much the toes move every time I land,
see that the toes are rubbing
against the front of the shoe
and the nails come loose.
So that's kind of the benefit of the orthotic.
Home remedies, I actually love the home remedies.
They work well because if you follow the first
like 15 or so principles, we just showed.
If you keep your nails groom, good hygiene, good socks,
good shoes, limit your sweat,
limit all that kind of stuff,
getting as good as shape as possible.
Then all you need to do is the only things
you really need to do is get something
like Vicks VaporRub, get something
like tea tree oil droplets,
get any the stuff
that's kind of sold on Amazon for a couple of bucks
or down in our show notes,
always check with your doctor first.
That's the disclaimer,
all this stuff works really well.
If it's well-groomed and you're applying it.
So generally just putting a little bit
on your toenails every night
when you go to bed at night,
you're gonna gradually start
to see a lot of softening and improvement.
And as that loose skin and nail comes off,
just clip it and groom it gently
or work with your podiatrist to get rid of it.
And that's really all you need.
So Vicks VaporRub, tea tree oil works really good.
Even Listerine, Listerine soaks were really good.
So what happens is
you can even do this in the form of a foot soak,
or you can put a little bit of the Vicks VaporRub
on your toenail,
or you could do it all together.
So putting some Listerine
in a small little bowl with your toenails
and diluting it with water
and just soaking it for 10 minutes.
Some people do that.
Some people do bleach,
although be careful stuff like bleach.
You don't wanna burn it, damage your skin.
Some people rave about it,
but I think it's dangerous.
If you're gonna soak,
I'm a big fan of Epsom salt soaks,
Epsom salts, soften your nails.
They may come easier to clip and groom
and they kind of soak up into your callus
and make that callus kind of get softer.
So you could kind of file that callus down.
So home remedies can be soaks
or they can be easy stuff to put on,
because things like Vicks VaporRub are toxic
to fungus because they have menthol in it.
Menthol is toxic in higher quantities
to fungus and bacteria.
So is tea tree oil.
So is Listerine.
Those commercials are on something
where you're flushing your mouth
and the Listerine's killing it.
This stuff, there's a lot of studies.
I'm not gonna get into them here,
but it does show effectiveness.
Get as healthy as possible.
Get vitamin D, get sunlight,
eat your daily multivitamin, Byetta
there's all these studies.
They're not concrete studies,
but these things can all help.
Being as healthy as possible,
eating your vegetables, taking your supplements.
They always help.
Do that stuff.
Number 17, medicated nail polish is
when you go see your podiatrist,
we can write stuff like Penlac or Ciclopirox.
These are like nail polishes
with antifungal stuff in there.
These are covered by prescription.
Some of these things are a little bit outrageously priced.
That's why you might not wanna go to them first line,
but I love the topical solutions.
They're safe.
They get right into the fungus,
but you have to see your podiatrist
and you have to usually have insurance
to have them covered.
Cash pay they're not too expensive,
but it's not meant to be a cash product.
Then there's pills for people
who do have genetic disorders
who have severe fungus attacks on their skin.
Sometimes things like Antracol, Lamisil pills are needed,
but check with your doctor
because you might need liver studies.
You might need blood work to make sure it's working.
Make sure you see your podiatrist.
There's nail surgeries to remove the corner of the nail.
There's ways to just get rid of the nail.
If it's ugly,
if it's too big,
if you have severe genetic problems.
These things can really work.
So tell us which one works best for you.
We wanna hear from you.
We wanna hear your opinion,
let us know which of the tips and tricks works best.
And if we missed anything,
tell us what work great for you.
We wanna hear from you and thanks for watching.
