Medical expert of the article
New publications
Vitamins for nails
Last reviewed: 23.04.2024
All iLive content is medically reviewed or fact checked to ensure as much factual accuracy as possible.
We have strict sourcing guidelines and only link to reputable media sites, academic research institutions and, whenever possible, medically peer reviewed studies. Note that the numbers in parentheses ([1], [2], etc.) are clickable links to these studies.
If you feel that any of our content is inaccurate, out-of-date, or otherwise questionable, please select it and press Ctrl + Enter.
Vitamins are needed for nails, so that they are healthy, shiny and beautifully looked. If the nail plate lacks vitamins, the nails will look very ugly. What to do with it and where to take vitamins?
What does the nail consist of?
The nail plate, the one on which we make manicure drawings and which we admire - beautiful and neat - consists of a substance called keratin. It is a protein substance that is present in the skin and hair. It is keratin that makes them shiny and elastic.
Keratin in the nail platinum is not just one layer, but several. When the keratin is enough, the nail looks healthy. Between keratin plates are located fat and water - also layers. If they are not enough, the nail looks pale and ugly.
By the way, the nail plate has the property of absorbing liquid (water and everything that hands touch). If a person often washes dishes or floors without gloves, their nail plate can be brittle, thick and brittle. Therefore, when washing floors, utensils and other contact with water, always use rubber gloves. Nails are always easier to protect than treat.
What vitamins can the nails lack?
In the nail itself, besides keratin, there is also sulfur. And besides it - chrome, zinc, phosphorus, calcium, selenium. These substances, if they are not enough in the nail, must necessarily be taken from vitamin complexes.
If the above elements are missing in the nail plate, it becomes brittle, and the nail growth slows down.
To understand if you have enough vitamins for the nail plate, pay attention to the growth rate of your nails. On average, they grow up to 1 mm in a week (this is on hand), and on the legs - up to 0.25 mm.
Scales on the nail plate are updated, but very slowly. You will have a new nail plate for six months.
What to do with nails if they break?
Nails break, if you do not take many micronutrients from vitamin complexes and products. This happens in those who constantly exhaust themselves with low-calorie diets. Nutrition in which there is not enough fat, protein or carbohydrates, makes the nails brittle and does not allow them to grow normally.
Bad nutrition, you provoke a violation of blood circulation under the nail plate and normal metabolism, which does not contribute to the health of nails. Balance your diet with the help of a dietitian.
For what reasons can the nails break?
It can be a genetic inherited feature of the body. Then you need to consult a doctor-pathologist - a specialist in health and the form of nails. Or, if this is not, then to the therapist and nutritionist - for the formation of a vitamin complex and a healthy diet. If their recommendations do not help, nails will have to be increased.
If by nature the nails have always been beautiful, and now suddenly they began to break down - this can be corrected by the right menu and multivitamins. The fact is that many vitamins do not produce the body, so they must be obtained from outside.
[1]
Properties of vitamins for nails
If the nails do not have enough vitamin A, they break down, and the nail plate is very dry to the touch.
If the nails do not have enough vitamin C, then on the nail platinum in some places there are dense patches of patches. And nails are frayed and can bend over the edges.
The lack of vitamin B for your nails is the white stripes on the nail plate, and the nails do not practically grow. In addition, the touch surface of the cuticle is uneven, rough.
The lack of vitamins of the PP group in the body is the dirty gray or yellow color of the nail plate, besides it is dull.
What can I do to make my nails healthy?
In addition to the recommendations above: to protect nails from harmful liquids, putting on gloves, to enrich your diet with useful products, you also need the right vitamin complex.
Namely: vitamins A, E, D, C. You can take them as from products: fish, meat, eggs, hard cheeses, milk, fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts and seeds, berries, and from multivitamin complexes.
The vitamins listed above complement each other's action very well, therefore it is better to take them in a complex.
Be healthy with the right vitamins and reasonable nutrition.