Anyone or their child had surgery for ingrown toe nails ?

[thriftychic]

My eldest ds had the toenail partially removed and a chemical to stop it coming back . He had to have the dressings changed daily and it took ages to heal BUT my younger son has just had the same problem except for his had some fleshy tissue there aswell known as a granuloma and his operation is totally different and drastic!
Have taken off the bandage to find his toe stitched up right the way up the side and it just looks a mess !
The doctor had said ' i might throw a couple of stitches in' but i stupidly expected it to be much the same as his brothers!
tbh i found this doctor a bit odd and was toying with the idea of going somewhere else but didnt because ds2 was desperate to get it sorted.
some one tell me they had stitches too...or is this guy some kind of crazy butcher?
He is a peadiatric surgeon at a private hospital.

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Hi thriftychic, i had to have two operations on my right big toe last year due to an infected ingrown toenail .
It's a bit of a long story but basically the first op was to remove the sides of the ingrown nail in the hope that it would be enough to sort it out. It wasn't and i was in a lot of pain :( The second op they had to remove the whole toenail and it did look grim once the bandages came off. I'm happy to report that this 2nd op seems to have worked brilliantly :) the nail is growing back although still looks a little odd. At least i have my feet hidden away at this time of year - am in the UK. I had my ops done on the NHS. Feel free to ask away if you have any questions.

Hi, thanks for the reply. DS2 looks as though part of the nail has gone but i dont understand why there are stitches all over the place . did you have stitches with yours ?

Sympathies... my DD had to stay in hospital for a week on antibiotics after having to have quite drastic surgery on her toe. I'm no expert, but I think having the granuloma removed (scar tissue that builds up underneath and causes problems with nail growth), I think it reasonable that stitches might be necessary.

No, i didn't have any stitches with mine. I hope your ds2 recovers well.

thankyou. I took ds2 back yesterday but for some reason i just dont like this doctor.
He said the stitches were a bit tight and he would take them out early. Ds2 has what looks like a blister on the top of his toe and its now gone quite a dark colour , the doctor was a bit dismissive of it and said it was because of the stitches but the stitches werent even on that bit!

I also asked why such a different operation than ds1 had had and he got quite defensive really and said 'thats just the way i do it ' i asked why he preferred that method and he said 'thats how i was taught'
tbh ds2 toe looks a mess to me and i think i may be taking him to my G.P

I'm a podiatrist, did he burn the root out with the phenol or did he cut the root out with a scalpel?

Hi Fluffy im pretty sure he said he had used phenol. he also said yesterday that the reason he had stitches lower than the bottom of the nail i.e part way down his toe was because thats how far down he had to go to get to the root of the nail.
He has said he can put his shoes on and go to school as normal but looks a bit dodgy for keeping ina shoe all day.

think he also said it was a wedge excision ??

Nail roots are quite shallow, if you leave even a tiny amount of root behind it will grow back, usually in a thin round shape if it's a wedge excision. It may be that he's taken a portion of healthy tissue to make sure he got all the root.

It's why pods use phenol, less regrowth (can still happen) but takes longer to heal.

If it was my child I would ask the gp if he had the letter off the surgoen yet explaining what he has had done yet. It should tell you if he has had phenol or not.

If any of the toes get this again go to the nhs pod, we only use phenol and you can stay with the child during the op and we also write letters to the school explaining why the child cannot do sports/swimming.

Use your own instincts wrt when he is ready to wear shoes again. Some of us heal faster than others.