Does Anyone Know The Recovery Time For A Total Nail Ablation?

[leisurely]

This is something a doctor recommended yesterday. I have horribly curly toenails due to a deep seated fungal infection. I have been treated for 9 months with an antifungal tablet whose name escapes me. As it isn't improving in any way, he did suggest surgery to remove my toe nails and kill the nail root so it doesn't grow back.

Now, he couldn't answer my question so, how long until I can wallk normally and is the risk of infection greater in Thailand or UK. I could wait until we go back for the summer, but I'd rather get it over and done with soon.

I heal very well and have no other health problems, I do smoke and drink alcohol, but as I said, that hasn't ever retarded any healing.

Thank you.

[taxexile]

it sounds like very radical treatment , fungal nail infections can take ages to clear up , but if you have no toenails , especially on the big toe , then walking becomes difficult.

the toenail acts as a splint and prevents the toe curling up as you walk. with a nail-less toe the big toe will be bendy and impede walking....... i think.

i had a big toenail removed when i was a kid because it was ingrowing and became infected.

took about 4 months to grow back , it was a brutal procedure.

i think they use lasers now rather than meathooks and pliers.

[leisurely]

Thanks for the reply. I did in fact have my nails off and beds reshaped around 7 years, ago. The agony was indescribable and I now suspect meathooks to be the cause. This was following a course of antifungals that you took in a pulse. cost me an arm and a leg and were as useless as the ones I have just come off.

The surgeon at the time told me I would be begging him to cut my feet off at the ankle. I scoffed. By the time I was discharged two days later I would have gladly done it myself.

I will be having a general anaesthetic.

[taxexile]

google 'fungal nail infections' and look at some of the american medical sites.

there are some new drugs available that are supposed to be superior to the old ones.

[davidjtayler]

I had both big toenails and beds removed when i was a young DJT 6 months apart as the final fight against 4 years of chronic ingrowing toenails and infected big toes.

My left big toe is now totally nailess but the right big toe has a small 'limited' nail that grew back but without the problems of before so all in all a good result.

Regarding the nailess toe this hardens over pretty quickly with skin and there are no problems walking or with 'toe curl' ... it's as good as new just minus the nail.

Both toenails were operated on under local anaesthetic and the right nail and bed were manually removed with cutters and plyers of some sort ... the pain when the 'local' wore off was excruciating and I had to load myself with Demerol for a week until things had started healing ... probably took about 3 weeks before it was walkable again ... remember this nail eventually grew back albeit smaller than original.

The left nail was removed manually same as the right but the nail bed was dissolved using caustic soda ... interesting fact here was that this toe was much less painful when the 'local' wore off and I was walking around again within 10 days no problem ... remember that this toe nail never grew back ... so all in all a better procedure in my opinion.

I know fungal infections take a long long time to be cured using topical treaments and like bacteria there are many different types of fungi with many different treatments ... maybe an idea is to get your Doc to send some nail clippings to the local microbiology lab who can then culture the fungi ... once identified this will help in the treatment that they will be able to recommend accordingly.