hangnail

A hangnail on left-hand little finger

A hangnail or agnail is a small, torn piece of skin near a fingernail or toenail. Unlike whitlows, hangnails are usually caused by dry skin or (in the case of fingernails) nail biting, and may be prevented with proper moisturization of the skin.

When attempting to remove a hangnail, additional skin may be painfully ripped off if its attachment if not broken properly. This may lead to a painful infection called paronychia. Therefore, hangnails should usually be cut using nail scissors or a nail clipper; biting them frequently makes it worse. People with a hangnail should be careful to cut it all off and rub hand lotion into the cuticles two to three times a day.^[1]

The term "hangnail" is misleading, as a hangnail is not an actual part of the nail. It is dead, dried skin, not nail, the latter being mostly made up of keratin, a tough fibrous protein. It can, however, also include a bit of nail, hanging loose from the rest of the body of the nail, attached to the nail bed.

Colloquial terms for hangnail in the UK include "catchy"^[2] and "stepmother's blessing".^[3]

Etymology

Agnail is the Middle English term meaning "corn". It comes from the Old English term angnægl (from ang- tight/painful + nægl- nail). Agnail was adapted to hangnail by a process of folk etymology.^[4]

References

1. ^ Home treatment for a hangnail
2. ^ Catchy
3. ^ Stepmother's blessing
4. ^ "Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary Entry for "hangnail"". http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=hangnail. 

External links

Look up hangnail or agnail in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Hangnail

• Hangnail article from MotherNature.com /The Doctors Book of Home Remedies II
• Home treatment from WebMD