A woman loses all her nails after having a pedicure with fish

An unorthodox beauty treatment designed to rejuvenate the feet has become a troubling medical mystery for this young woman. According to a case report published by his doctor at JAMA Dermatology the patient's nails ceased to grow and began to fall shortly after receiving a pedicure with fish.

pedicure with fish processing in which some small fish nibble your feet while soaking in a bath of warm water or at room temperature. The kind of fish used – a carp without teeth known as Garra rufa – is usually herbivorous, but when needed, it also eats dead human skin. It is said that the voracious feast of fish helps treat conditions such as psoriasis and beautify the skin, which gives them the nickname "doctor fish".

Unfortunately for the anonymous woman of about 20 years, her experience was all the less rejuvenating. After her pedicure, most of her nails stopped growing and began to fall, a condition known as onychomadesis. Six months after having problems with nails, she consulted a dermatologist who ruled out any known cause of onychomatosis, such as a serious illness or a side effect of certain drugs. The most likely culprit was the pedicure of fish

"Although the mechanism of action is not entirely clear, it is likely that the fish will traumatize the matrix of the nail," he says. he. assistant in dermatology at Weill Cornell Medicine at Columbia University and a female attending physician. The case, according to Lipner, would be the first documented case of onychomadese ever caused by fish.

To protect the anonymity of his patient, Lipner can not reveal where the woman had her pedicure. But he notes that these treatments are very popular outside the United States, for example in China. They reached their peak of popularity in the United States about ten years ago, but have since been banned in at least 10 states, including New York, largely because of health problems.

On the one hand, fish are often used in more than one person, which makes the risk of transmission of infections a real possibility. And although pedicure advocates with fish claim that they can properly disinfect animals and ferries between uses, researchers have shown that the bacteria that cause the disease can be found easily in the tanks and fish used in these spas. Some reports have also directly linked foot infections to these treatments.

"I do not recommend pedicures with fish for medical or aesthetic purposes," said Lipner. "In addition to onychomatosis, there are also serious infections associated with pedicures with fish."

As for the woman, her nails will probably grow back, but not for long. Lipner notes that nails grow only one millimeter per month on average, while a full nail can take up to 18 months to be replaced. "Therefore, we will have to wait a long time to see the result," he said.

[JAMA Dermatology]