A hangnail or agnail is a small, torn piece of skin

Skin

-Dermis:The dermis is the layer of skin beneath the epidermis that consists of connective tissue and cushions the body from stress and strain. The dermis is tightly connected to the epidermis by a basement membrane. It also harbors many Mechanoreceptors that provide the sense of touch and heat...

 on a fingernail or toenail. Unlike whitlow

Whitlow

A whitlow or felon is an infection of the tip of the finger. The terms are also sometimes misapplied to paronychia, which is an infection of the tissue at the side or base of the nail....

s, hangnails are usually caused by dry skin or (in the case of fingernails) nail biting

Nail biting

Onychophagia, or nail biting, is a common oral compulsive habit in children and adults.-Classification:Nail biting is considered an impulse control disorder in the DSM-IV-R; the ICD-10 classifies it as "other specified behavioral and emotional disorders with onset usually occurring in childhood and...

, and may be prevented with proper moisturization of the skin.

When attempting to remove a hangnail, additional skin may be painfully ripped off of its attachment if not broken properly. This may lead to a painful infection called paronychia

Paronychia

The nail disease paronychia , commonly misidentified as a synonym for whitlow or felon, is an often-tender bacterial or fungal hand infection or foot infection where the nail and skin meet at the side or the base of a finger or toenail...

. Therefore, hangnails should usually be cut using nail scissors or a nail clipper

Nail clipper

A nail cutter is a hand tool used to trim fingernails and toenails.-Design:Nail cutters are usually made of metal but can also be made of plastic. Two common varieties are the plier type and the compound lever type. A third variety of the push-button type has also been introduced. All are common...

; biting or pulling them frequently makes them 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.

The term "hangnail" can be 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

Keratin

Keratin refers to a family of fibrous structural proteins. Keratin is the key of structural material making up the outer layer of human skin. It is also the key structural component of hair and nails...

, 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. If the hangnail is nail and not skin, it is often necessary to rip it out from the nail bed because cutting it will allow it to grow back, although pain and infection are possible.

External links

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