Does Using Vicks For Nail Fungus Work?

If you have problems with toe nail or finger nail fungus, someone may have suggested you try using vicks vapor rub to treat it. And most people think this is a strange idea at best. Vicks for nail fungus? How can that work?

Well there are many people all over the world who have reported to use vicks for nail fungus successfully on themselves. There are just as many skeptics of course, and some people even think that the company who makes the product is responsible to starting these rumors.

Using vicks for nail fungus makes sense though, when you think about one of the primary ingredients in the product: Eucalyptus oil. Eucalyptus oil is a strong, natural antiseptic which has antifungal properties as well.

Another of the main ingredients in vicks is Camphor. This substance is good at penetrating the skin, and it too can repell pests due to its strong smell. The third active ingredient in vicks is Menthol, and it also is known to repell pests due to the smell.

So the eucalyptus oil can fight and kill the bacteria, and the camphor can help take the eucalyptus oil below the fungus infected nail. Now since all three of the main ingredients in vicks are known to repell pests due to their strong odors, it's quite possible that using vicks for nail fungus works simply due to that: It stinks out the fungus bacteria.

Regardless of why though, hundreds of people report having great success using vicks for nail fungus treatments. In most cases, you need to rub the vicks all over the affected fungus areas at least once each day, then cover it with some sort of cloth. If you're using vicks for nail fungus on your toe nails, then simply put some socks on after rubbing the vicks around your toes.

Some people may need to do the vicks treatment on their nail fungus two to three times each day to see the best results, and a lot of how well your fungus problems respond to the vicks will depend on how bad your fungus is when you start, how diligent you are about using the treatment every day, and how well you clean and clear out the areas around your nails.

Cleaning and clearing debris from around your fungus infected nails before treatment is extremely important. Doing this first will remove some of the layers that vicks - or any other nail fungus topical treatment you're using - will need to penetrate. Also be sure to remove as much dead skin from around your fungus infected nails too, because this also will allow the vicks or other treatment to penetrate better and faster.

Nail fungus is contagious as well, and this is why it's so important to be sure you're using your treatment at least once each day. If you skip a day, it's very possible for the nail fungus to spread. When this happens, it will simply take you that much longer to get rid of the problem.

And time is another factor for many people with nail fungus. Whether you're using vicks for nail fungus or not, it takes time to see results. In some cases you may start seeing new, healthy nail growth in just a week or two. Usually though, the problem is not fully solved until an entire new nail has grown in to replace all of the fungus infected nail. And for some people, growing a new nail can take almost a year to do.