white spots on fingernails

Factual Questions
1

You know those white marks you sometimes have under your fingernail. They grow out with the nail and eventually are cut off.

What they heck are they?

I’ve heard they are bruises from when you’ve banged your finger and injured the nail, especially before it’s totally formed (still under the cuticle).

I’ve also heard it’s from a nutritional deficiency.

What’s the real story?

2

Zinc deficiency

http://www.drlera.com/health_beauty/nutrition_information/zinc.htm

3

Not a zinc deficiency

4

I get these more than most people seem to Maybe my nails are just weaker of dont grow properly. Anyone I once read that it was zinc deficiancy so I got these chalated zinc tablets and took them for a few months and it didnt really make much difference.

Funny think is just recently I’ve noticed that for the first time in my life all the nails on my left hand are fine, they dont have any white bits. Probably just a fluke.

5

Or maybe you’re right handed, so your left hand is less prone to being banged around?

6

If they become noticeable only when you have been very ill otherwise, they can be one of the signs of arsenic poisoning.

Tea anyone?

7

Minor trauma to the nail.

Oh x-rays link says the same - so I second that. I read a medical text on fingernails which said there was no evidence spots (punctate leukonichia) had anything to do with deficiencies.

8

Here’s an old thread about this.

9

:smack:

Cecil