Can Nurses Cut Diabetic Toenails or Not?

Can nurses cut diabetic toenails

Nurses can absolutely cut diabetic toenails if the situation calls for it. There are going to be times when these toenails cause the patient a strong amount of discomfort.

Can nurses cut diabetic toenails?

Not all toenails are made the same and someone with the proper authority needs to do it so that the problem doesn’t spread further.

It can be very painful to go through and getting that those toenails removed are going to stop the pain from spreading any further.

Even without the full supervision of other people in the hospital.

Nurses can do just about anything when it comes to taking care of a patient’s toenails.

The threat of a bad toenail makes sure that they can take care of those functions which are good for the people who may currently be facing pain.

Overall, this means people who need immediate treatment for their toenails can immediately get it.

It’s not uncommon for people who need these procedures to get it done within the same day. Fortunately, the process doesn’t take that long in the first place.

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Can nurses cut diabetic toenails or not

Why do nurses cut diabetic toenails?

Cutting these toenails is a matter of health more than the aspect of cleanliness.

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Most people do not take care of their feet to the extent that it needs to be taken care of.

Having your toenails infected means it’s going to hurt to walk during the day.

This isn’t something that most people can afford to go through and it’s recommended that you take care of this immediately.

A registered nurse is going to know how to get rid of the problem without causing you any actual discomfort.

Why do nurses cut diabetic toenails?

Nurses trim your toenails to stop that pain from spreading even if it doesn’t immediately disappear.

These toenails can begin the infection of the toe which will drastically hurt the person’s ability to walk.

Even losing the ability to walk in a single toe means not doing athletic activities for many months at a time.

To an extent, we truly don’t know how much these diabetic toenails will affect the person who needs to use them.

The goal is going to be to restore those toenails to what they should be normally.

They also have to be cut since the fungus in the toenails can spread to other parts of the foot.

Once that happens it’s going to take several painful and extensive procedures to get rid of that fungus.

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How to trim diabetic toenails?

Generally, using a nail file is going to be the best way to go about this.

A nail clipper isn’t going to work in most cases, the patient is going to feel the clipper and it will be very painful for them.

The file is going to be the best way to attack parts of the toenail that are dead and what the patient isn’t going to feel.

It’s definitely going to take some time, but there’s a lot of progress that can be accomplished when it comes to the toenails if you do this regularly.

Best of all, it’s something that the patient can do in their spare time.

If this problem gets to a point where the patient can’t really feel their toenails anymore, they should be allowed to just cut it off.

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It’s going to completely stop that part of the foot from spreading to other parts as well as letting other parts of the foot be disinfected.

That’s something that can be a bit risky to do, however, if the patient asks for it, that should be fine in most cases.

There are also more ways when it comes to cutting those kinds of toenails, but they’re a lot riskier and less common.

See also: Diabetes Specialist Nurse Interview Questions

Can nurses cut diabetic fingernails?

Many of them do not do this, but sometimes, nurses will go about this process if the situation calls for it.

If the patient can’t feel their fingernail at all, it can be completely fine to cut those fingernails.

In many cases, a large chunk of that nail has to be taken out for any progress to start out.

It’s best to conder all of the options available to you and the patient before you make any rash decisions.

See also: Nursing Care Plan

When you go about this process, you usually have to commit to it, even if it hurts a lot.

Fortunately, you only have to do cut the sides off it.

Going headfirst into the middle of the fingernail can be somewhat dangerous and even go towards the part that really hurts.

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The stakes of doing this are going to be much higher since people do often think about the status of their hands and fingers much more than their toes.

They have the authority to do this for that exact reason, but there’s a lot more on the line if you make mistakes.

Be gentle and all will be taken care of when taking care of those nails.

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Conclusion: Can nurses cut diabetic toenails?

These nails can be some of the scariest that a nurse will deal with.

They aren’t normal to see and there’s no guarantee that you can ever truly get rid of them.

The patient is making the correct first step by going into the hospital to deal with this problem, but there’s no telling the pain that they will feel when going about this process.

These nails should always be a warning to a patient to not take their health for granted which is hopefully something that they won’t have to come in for again.

Since a lot of the nail is actually dead, the patient isn’t going to feel it, what is going to happen is that the infection will smell and spread to other parts of the foot.

See also: Nursing Care Plan for Infection

This can be problematic for many reasons.

For one, doing anything athletic with your foot is going to cause a lot of pain.

This is typically something that we take for granted but is a really big problem if you want to play soccer or football.

Now you should know whether can nurses cut diabetic toenails or not.

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About Ida Koivisto, BSN, RN, PHN

Ida is both a registered nurse and public health nurse. Her passion is to provide as much valuable information about nursing to the world as possible. In her spare time from work and blogging, Ida loves to work out at the gym and spend time with relatives.