Reflex Foot Care

Do I have a fungal nail infection?

Have you got a fungal nail?

Have you been treating it for months with no effect?

Are you sure that it is definitely a fungal nail you are treating?

Every week I see patients who come to me for fungal nail treatment.

Usually they have tried every over the counter fungal nail treatment available, along with all the weird treatments google suggests to use for fungal nails, to no avail.

About half of these patients won’t actually be suffering from fungal nails. Yes, half!

They could be suffering from thickened and discoloured nails due to trauma (one off or repetitive), a damaged nail due to psoriasis or an infection of the nail which either isn’t caused by a fungus or caused by a fungus that isn’t susceptible to the main antifungal ingredient found in over the counter treatments.

Studies have shown that even experts in the field of fungal nails (dermatologists & podiatrists) at very best can only be around 67% accurate by visual diagnosis meaning they still get 1 in 3 diagnoses wrong.

Clinical guidelines and published research demonstrate it is best practice to test a sample of the nail for fungus before commencing treatment.

That way causes of discoloured nails other than fungus, can be ruled out and by testing the nail we remove the risk of patients treating (and paying) for expensive treatments which will not work for the condition you have.

So how can we test the nail to confirm the presence of fungus?

Currently there are 2 main ways to test your nail:

GP test

You can take a clipping of your nail and your GP can arrange for this to be sent off to a laboratory where they can test to see if fungus grows.

If it does, the type of fungus and what it is best treated with is reported.

This test is free to you (covered under NHS), but your GP does have to agree to test the nail.

The process can take up to 6 weeks to get a result, but unfortunately isn’t highly sensitive.

We find there are a lot of false negatives and many get returned as there isn’t a large enough sample to test.

You are unable to have this test after any antifungal agents on the nail, so these need to be stopped and fully removed before a sample is taken.

Or, there’s our way…

At Reflex you can be confident you are receiving the correct treatment with professional fungal nail testing and branded medicaments, following N.I.C.E guidelines . We will not recommend any shop made potions or lotions that have no scientific evidence proven to work on dermatophytes in fungal nails.

There’s a new clinical test for nail infections which gives accurate results in under 5 minutes!

No more having to wait to visit your GP, who as stated above, will probably request nail clippings to be sent away to an NHS laboratory and grown on a culture, with results expected in several weeks, that can often come-back as a false-negative result.

At Reflex Foot Care, we offer you a quick and highly accurate in-clinic test (97% accurate with reliable scientifically proven results compared with 46% – 54% accuracy of that with traditional laboratory route), with results confirmed within only 5 minutes of taking a nail sample!

It’s the new clinical diagnostic test, developed in Japan and brought to the United Kingdom by renowned Podiatrist, author and researcher, Dr Ivan Bristow.

This simple and effective Five Minute Fungal Nail Test is transforming the way foot healthcare professionals diagnose dermatophyte (fungal) nail infections with rapid and highly effective in-clinic test results.

Rapid Results in just a few minutes, whilst you wait
No need to send your nail clippings to the NHS laboratory
No long waiting time for results, which may take up to 4 weeks via NHS
Detects the presence of all common fungus types from the smallest sample of nail
Immediate diagnosis, allowing us to treat the infection without delay
Scientifically proven to give highly accurate and reliable results

The test works by a process known as immune chromatography, which is also found in a pregnancy test.

It contains an antibody that specifically reacts with a chemical found in the dermatophyte infection which causes most fungal nail infections.

When an infected nail sample is added to the solution this chemical is released and picked up by the test.

A pink line occurs in the test strip to confirm the test has worked whilst the appearance of a purple-brown line below it confirms the presence of fungus in the nail.

Hayley Wright

Five Minute Fungal Nail Test

The new clinical nail test for fungal nail infections

Do I have a fungal nail infection?

So how can we test the nail to confirm the presence of fungus?

GP test

Or, there’s our way…

Professional Foot Care, You Can Trust!