Is Tea Tree Oil Effective For Nail Fungus?

Davidjhonnson
3 min readOct 6, 2021

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Onychomycosis, or nail fungus, can infect the nails on the hands or feet. Toenail fungus is quite frequent.

Most nail fungus treatments do not completely eliminate the fungus, but they can help keep it from spreading. These conventional drugs, however, can cause skin irritation and other side effects such as ingrown nails.

As a result, some people have turned to natural products to treat nail fungus, such as tea tree oil.

While tea tree oil appears to have antifungal effects, its effectiveness in treating nail fungus is unknown. Tea tree oil, like conventional treatments, can have some unfavorable side effects.

This article discusses research on tea tree oil’s antifungal qualities. We talk about if tea tree oil works for nail fungus, how to apply it, and any potential adverse effects.

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Is it effective?

There has been very little research on tea tree oil as a specific treatment for nail fungus. The available research is summarised below.

Laboratory research findings
Tea tree oil research as a therapy for nail fungus is currently contradictory.
According to a 2013 laboratory study, tea tree oil is beneficial in treating the fungus Trichophyton rubrum (T. rubrum). This fungus often affects the toes and can result in an athlete’s foot.

The study found that tea tree oil was much more effective than a placebo at inhibiting the growth of T. rubrum.

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The researchers, on the other hand, used lab-grown T. rubrum cultures and human nail clippings in their experiments. It is unknown whether tea tree oil has the same impact on diseased nail tissue in humans.

The tea tree oil was also delivered as a nanosuspension by the researchers. A nanosuspensionTrusted Source is made up of microscopic particles of a medicine suspended in water, making the drug more absorbable. It is unclear whether commonly accessible types of tea tree oil would have the same antifungal effects on nails.

Human-related research findings

Two previous research looked into the effects of tea tree oil on human nail fungus.

According to a 1994 study According to Trusted Source, tea tree oil applied directly to toenail fungus is just as efficient as clotrimazole lotion. Clotrimazole is an antifungal cream that can be obtained through a doctor’s prescription or from a pharmacy.

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A 1999 study trusted Source looked into whether an antifungal ointment containing tea tree oil may help manage toenail fungus. As a control, the researchers utilized tea tree oil alone. For 16 weeks, participants used either the combination cream or a placebo.

In 80 percent of the cases, the combo cream totally treated the nail fungus. However, no one who only used the tea tree observed any benefit.

Results that contradict each other
The three trials produce disparate results in terms of tea tree oil’s usefulness as an antifungal nail therapy.

More research is needed to evaluate the effects of tea tree oil on humans. Scientists feel that any future research should look into the impacts of commonly available kinds of tea tree oil.

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