Re: Utility of Gel Nails

Dear Editor,

We would like to discuss the report on “Utility of gel nails”.[1] Nanda and Grover noted that “the use of Gel nails in patients with cosmetically disfiguring nail plate surface abnormalities (like trachyonychia, onychoschizia, pitting, etc.) was found to produce good to excellent improvement in most of the cases”.[1] Nanda and Grover also mentioned for no side-effect of gel nails. In fact, the present report by Nanda and Grover is on only a few cases. There are some other reports mentioned for the problem of gel nails. For example, Vázquez-Osorio et al. reported on allergic dermatitis due to acrylates in acrylic gel nails.[2] The problem of allergic dermatitis has to be kept in mind and investigated before using gel nails for cosmetic purposes. Contact dermatitis, asthma and allergy around the eyes and nose are notable adverse effects of artificial gel nails.[3] In addition, there are also other additional adverse effects.[3] Ill-fitting nails can lead to recurrent trauma and pyogenic granuloma.[3] At present, artificial nails have been banned in some healthcare set-ups citing carriage of harmful bacteria under the nail.