Question
Hey Doctor Tsatsos.

My name is Joshua. I'm from South Africa and I'm 15 years old.

About 2 weeks ago I had surgery. I had been suffering from two ingrown toenails on each of my big toes for a year. They had become severely infected with time (the surgeon said it was one of the worst infections he had seen) and therefore a wedge-resection was out of the question. The nails had to be fully removed.

As I've mentioned before, this happened about two weeks ago. Now I'm able to walk comfortably with shoes (provided that they have ample space for my toes to move about) and scabs have already formed on both my toes. I'm able to touch them without hurting myself and even apply medium pressure to them when I press them to keep the gauze in place as I rewrap my bandages.

However, I'm in a bit of a dilemma right now. See, I'm in a boarding house and there isn't a bathtub in sight. As with most boarding houses, we only have showers. I've preserved my hygiene to thus far by standing near a sink and applying shower gel before washing it off with handfuls of water and drying the floor afterwards. Of course this is terribly tedious and I'm unable to wash hair etc. So my question is, is it safe to use the shower yet, or should I use the same routine until the nail grows back?

Answer
This Chicago, South Loop & Elmhurst Podiatric Sports Medicine Doc of AnklenfootCenters.com says.......

Dear Joshua,

That's an old wives tale!
Go enjoy your shower!-but shower up in a few minutes.
When you shower-make sure that there is not a pool of water for the toe and that the water runs freely off the toe.Gently clean the toe-without disturbing the clots.
After the shower-pat the area dry gently with a clean are of the towel. Proceed with the gauze dressing and keep from over taping the dressing. The moisture that may be bad is the moisture that collects in tight water resistant dressings. Loose gauze with a small dab of antibiotic ointment if necessary is best. If the dressing gets wet-change it.

We are specialists in orthopedics & surgery of the  foot & ankle

Good Luck!

Dr George Tsatsos & Svetlana Zats
Podiatrist Chicago 60618 & Elmhurst 60126 Podiatrists
Board Certified in Foot and Ankle Surgery & Orthopedics
New South Loop Location-Chicago 60661
AnkleNFoot.com
Runnersdoc.com
BabyFootDoc.com

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Hope this helps!

Good Luck!