Fish Tank Pedicures Can Be Dangerous

[fountainhall]

They seem to be all over Bangkok and probably elsewhere as well. Tanks with little fish. You insert your feet and they eat the loose skin making your feet feel fresh again. Well, it's now been discovered that you can lose more than those scaly bits. There's a chance you might soon lose your toes.

After a young woman's toenails started to separate from her toes, a doctor finally zeroed in on the reason: a fish pedicure, according to a report published Tuesday in the journal JAMA Dermatology.

Six months prior, the woman had dunked her feet in a tub of water filled with tiny fish called Garra rufa that will eat dead human skin when no plankton are around. It wasn't until later on that she noticed her nails beginning to shed.

"I think that this is probably more common than we think," said the report's author, Dr. Shari R. Lipner, an assistant professor of dermatology at Weill Cornell Medicine and director of the nail division.

"We don't see the [nail] shedding until months after the event, so I think it's hard for patients and physicians -- especially if they're not even aware that fish pedicures can do this -- to make that connection," she said.

https://edition.cnn.com/2018/07/03/heal ... index.html

[Gaybutton]

There's a chance you might soon lose your toes.

Unless I missed something, the article says you could lose your toenails, but I didn't see anything that said you could also lose your toes.

It is also controversial. One doctor claims it is because of the fish. Another doctor says it has nothing to do with the fish, but it can happen to women who wear high heel shoes.

In any case, as long as I've lived in Thailand this is the first time I've ever heard of this. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people get the 'fish treatment' every day. I've done it many times too - and all of my toes and toenails are still there.

So, I'm not exactly frightened off by this article and I don't buy the idea that these fish caused the problem. I'd be a hell of a lot more afraid of swimming in Pattaya's polluted seawater than I would be of the 'fish treatment.'

[thewayhelooks]

Piranha are quicker and more efficient.

[a447]

I wouldn't dream of sticking my feet into a tank of water previously used by so many others.

Yuk!

[fountainhall]

Unless I missed something, the article says you could lose your toenails, but I didn't see anything that said you could also lose your toes.

My error - typing too fast!

[Gaybutton]

I wouldn't dream of sticking my feet into a tank of water previously used by so many others.

Isn't there something you often stick into boys - previously used by so many others . . . ?