Verruca Embarrassment?
Help. How do I get rid of my Verruca Embarrassment?
We do know that verrucas are not the first thing you will bring up in polite conversation and many of us find them embarrassing.
However, here at the Chelsea clinic we are experts at verruca removal and is it quite a common condition arriving at our doorstep.
What is a verruca?
Fortunately warts known as verrucas on the sole of the feet are harmless despite causing embarrassment. There are generally 3 types we see these include the HPV 1, 2 and 4 all of which can respond slightly differently to the various forms of treatment available.
Small black dots?
You may notice all of a sudden a small bump that looks like it may have callous sprouting around its edges and it may even have some black dots at its centre. However not all verrucae have the hall mark appearance of black dots.
Have I got a verruca or a corn?
It is very easy to mix up a corn with a callous or a verruca. Corns tend to be lesions that are a build-up of tissue that grows inwards and can occur due to always stepping on that particular part of your foot. Typically gathering momentum and pain described as ‘like stepping on a shard of glass’ which builds over weeks in some cases months – this tends to be more than likely corn tissue.
Scar tissue – really not a verruca?
Scar tissue can also look very similar to corn tissue. It tends to form from having over the months even years ‘hacking’ away at your skin trying to pick something off that you are not quite sure what it is. From the micro damage the skin then starts to also look different and can appear paler.
So I do have a verruca
A verruca usually tends to appear all of a sudden, maybe you had cut on your foot a little earlier and now there is an opening for the virus to enter. Verrucas can be described as feeling ‘prickly’, ‘no pain’ to ‘very painful’.
The striations (lines) in the skin do not change in corn tissue, although the corn tissue can appear glassy looking and have a much harder texture. With a verruca there is disruption to the striations returning to normal around the lesion. The skin on the actual lesion appears almost swollen, engorged and pale. Scar tissue appears weaker and paler having lost its original elasticity
How do I catch a verruca?
Verrucas are caused by what is known as the human papilloma virus (HPV) whch has various strains and is responsible for other bodily lesions such as cold sores. It can be passed on from person to person by direct contact. The HPV virus can thrive in moist, warm or damp environments such as changing room floors and communal showers. It is possible to contract the virus by simply walking on the same floor as someone who already has a verruca, especially if there is a cut or break in the skin which can make it easier for the virus to penetrate. At the Chelsea clinic we have picked up a number of clients who just for having stayed overnight in a hotel having walking barefoot across the hotel carpet or having tried on a pair of shoes at a shop without socks have managed to pick up this HPV virus.
How do I treat my feet verruca?
Here at the Chelsea clinic we can offer more conservative treatments that cause little pain we also encourage evidenced back medicine including the Faulknor’s method of needling
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4470114/
or low level IV laser, however, please do stay away from the old wives tales of bananas, potatoes, cider or tea tree oil – they do not work.
Check out our verruca treatment page here:
If you want to know about effective verruca removal we are more than happy to help and to discuss this in further detail with you please call on ☎️ 0207 101 4000,📧 email info@thechelseaclinic.uk or 📚book here.
