What is a Wart?
Warts are usually small, hard, rough viral lumpy growths on the skin.
As such, they can be found almost anywhere on the skin; most commonly on the hands and feet. Warts on the feet are often referred to as “verrucae” and if they’re on the bottom of the foot, then they are often called plantar warts.
Plantar warts are often found on weight-bearing areas of the feet; around the heels and the pressure can cause them to grow inwards beneath thickened layers of skin. Plantar warts can often become painful.
Warts on the hands are not usually painful but can be unsightly and be a cause of social embarrassment. The good news for these Common Warts is that it is often easier to get rid of warts on the hands, as they are not pushed into the skin, unlike the Flat Warts or Plantar Warts on the bottom of the feet.
What causes Warts?
All warts are caused by one of the many strains of the Human Papilloma Virus, and there are around 130 known strains. But thankfully, Common Warts on the hands and Plantar Warts (Verruca) on the feet are caused by the low-risk, non-cancerous strains.
Although there are amongst others, Oral Warts, Genital Warts and Filiform Warts (often found on eyelids), here at We Fix Feet, we concentrate on treating those on your hands and feet.
Warts on your Fingers and Hands
Fingers and hands are particularly vulnerable to infection. There are several types of warts which can be found on the fingers and hands including common warts, butchers’ warts, flat warts, palmar warts or periungual and subungual warts that occur around and under the fingernails or toenails.
How to Remove Warts
Warts may clear up on their own without treatment. However, this may take months or years. In the meantime, being viral lesions, they can also spread.
The best treatment method for wart removal is determined by the wart you have and how quickly you want it removed. All wart treatments cause controlled trauma to the skin which through the skin’s inflammatory response stimulates the immune system to recognise and destroy the Human Papilloma Virus causing warts. Younger people often have more responsive immune systems that can pick up on the HPV, than those in later life. Therefore, as we age, our immune system is less likely to pick-up on the wart-causing virus, which can often hide itself meaning some intervention to kick-start detection and destruction is necessary.
Treatment Options Include:
- Do nothing and hope it goes away on its own. However, if you have had the wart for a prolonged period of time, this is unlikely to happen.
- Swift Verruca Treatment – highly effective with little or no downtime or pain after each treatment.
- Cryosurgery Verucca Treatment – freezing the wart to -89°C. After time and several applications at fortnightly intervals, the wart will often fall off.