When it comes to taking care of your body, it’s important to start from the ground up if you want to have consistently beautiful feet.
Feet are very similar to hands, but they don’t get similar treatment because our hands are always on display. It is very easy to neglect your feet, but it’s a very bad habit which can lead to yellow, chipped thick toenails, fungal infections and a bevy of other unsightly conditions.
At Delray Beach Podiatry, we want to help keep your feet looking great by offering these simple beauty tips:
1. Keep your feet clean
Your feet accumulate a lot of dirt and sweat throughout the day so it’s important to wash your feet daily with warm, soapy water. Then, you need to make sure your feet are dry afterwards as any excess moisture (especially in between your toes) can increase the chances of getting an infection.
2. Moisturize
Just the way you moisturize the skin on your face and your hands, it’s important that you moisturize your feet as well. Before moisturizing, however, try using a pumice stone to file away dry skin while you’re in the shower, where the warm water helps soften your skin and slough the dead skin away. Once you are out of the shower, apply your chosen foot cream to your feet when they are still a little bit damp. This will help prevent your feet from becoming dry and cracked.
3. Soak
A foot soak soothes your muscles, hydrates your skin and can relieve aches and pains due to standing for hours or walking in uncomfortable shoes. There are a wide variety of soaks to be found on the internet — the most basic being an Epsom salt bath — whose benefits range from managing foot and toenail fungus to softening the skin and drawing toxins out from your body. If you have varicose veins, soaking your feet past the ankles in cool water can help your body recover from this condition of the veins.
To learn more about a few simple foot soaks for your feet, click here.
4. Go barefoot
It’s a good habit to take your shoes off after you get home, so that you can let your feet breathe. This will help limit the amount of sweat and dirt that build up in your shoes during the day. If you allow dirt and sweat to stay on your feet longer than necessary, you’re putting yourself at an increased risk for ground for athlete’s foot and other diseases.
5. Trim your toenails
Although it may seem like a fairly simple task on the surface, proper technique when trimming toenails plays a large role in preventing ingrown toenails and infections. Guide the clippers straight across the nail of each toe to avoid rounding the nail’s corners or cutting the sides at an angle, which can lead the corners to grow toward your skin and become ingrown. It’s also important to always clean and disinfect your clippers with rubbing alcohol before and after using them.
For more toenail cutting tips, click here.
Bonus tip: Remove nail polish
Over time, nail polish can wear down your nails. It’s important to remove all old layers before reapplying new polish. If you can, let your toenails go polish-free for few hours to help strengthen your nails.
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Follow Dr. Goldbaum on Twitter @Delray_Podiatry
The content on this website is for informational purposes only. Do not rely or act upon information from www.DelrayBeachPodiatry.com without seeking professional medical advice. If you live in South Florida and would like a consultation with Dr. Ian Goldbaum, a podiatric physician and surgeon with over 30 years of experience, please see our contact information below:
DELRAY BEACH
16244 S. Military Trail #290, Delray Beach, FL 33484
561-499-0033
BOCA RATON
2900 N. Military Trail #210, Boca Raton, FL 33431 (SOUTH BLDG)
561-499-2683
BOYNTON BEACH
8198 Jog Road #100, Boynton Beach, FL 33472
561-736-4002
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