Keep Your Hands Healthy

Keep Your Hands Healthy

Share facial treatments: Vitamin C, retinol, and alpha- and beta-hydroxy acids benefit the skin on our hands. Apply a bit of treatment whenever you use it on your face.

- Exfoliate: employ a grainy scrub on backs of hands twice a week to expose glowing skin.
- Keep cuticles neat: Cuticles function as barriers to bacteria and fungus, but they can often overgrow. Use a wooden or metal cuticle pusher after a shower to keep them in line.

- Liberate tension: Most of us hold tension in our necks and shoulders, but we can also carry the stress of the day in our hands. Give yours a daily self-massage to keep them tension-free.

- Seal cuticle tears: Tiny hangnails and bitten edges can catch on almost anything, rotating into deep tears and possibly leading to infection.

- Keep them covered: enclosed them by applying a liquid bandage product as soon as tears develop.

- Keep nail short: Long talons tend to look garish, and invite breaks that can be painful. File nails to a quarter-inch above your fingertips.

- Give nails breathing room: Specialist suggests you take a one-week break from polish every month.

- Tap, tap, tap! Believe it or not, tapping your fingernails on a hard surface excites nail health and growth.

- Get a manicure: Sure, doing your own nails is inexpensive and practical, but a professional manicure every two or three months is a welcome bit of pampering. What's more, pros can contract with strong problems like callus and flaking cuticles better than you can at home.