ABSTRACT

Ingrown toenails can be treated using several surgical methods. The long-term esthetic outcome of such treatments is important for the patients, but the physicians often neglect it. This study aimed to compare the long-term esthetic results of 2 different surgical methods to treat ingrown toenails: lateral foldplasty and lateral matricectomy.

Postoperative photographs of patients’ toes were retrospectively evaluated using a visual analog scale (VAS) and seven criteria: general esthetic appearance of the great toe, nail plate, proximal periungual fold, medial periungual fold, lateral periungual fold, toe distal to the nail plate, and scars.

Two investigators evaluated the photographs of 16 great toes (8 treated via lateral foldplasty and 8 treated via lateral matricectomy). Both investigators gave significantly higher VAS scores to the photographs of toes treated via lateral foldplasty, indicating better esthetic results.

The present findings showed that lateral foldplasty yields better long-term esthetic results than lateral matricectomy. We suggest that surgeons treating ingrown toenails should choose the lateral foldplasty instead of lateral matricectomy to achieve better esthetic results.

Keywords: Esthetic, foldplasty, lateral, matricectomy, nail surgery, result