Handy Hygiene: How to Clean and Cut Your Baby’s Nails

During a time where washing hands is the most important thing we can do, STYLIDEAS have all the top tips on keeping your little one's hands clean and tidy...

Happy Birthday to you…Happy Birthday to you…washing hands has become the activity of the year.

Now with schools open and the spread of Covid-19 a permanent worry, ensuring your little one’s hands are clean is more important than ever. We tend to think washing hands solves all our germ-based problems, but studies show that there is always more hiding under the surface…

The subungual region (area underneath the nail) can be impervious to soap and anti-bacterial agents, meaning there is always space for germs to harvest under the nail. Children are always exploring with their hands, particularly as babies - putting fingers in mouths, noses, dirt in playgrounds, which means they collect plenty of germs under their nails. It doesn’t matter how much they wash their hands, if their nails are long enough, there will always be a home for bacteria such as Staphylococcus, Micrococcus, Bacillus, Salmonella, E.Coli and Norovirus, right at their fingertips.

The Centre for Disease Control and Prevention recommend keeping nails short and clean, to minimise the chances of bacteria being able to roost under nails. Ingesting bacteria, yeast and fungi caught in the subungual region, can cause tummy bugs, diarrhoea and other sorts of nasties. But when children are constantly wriggling about or uncomfortable with nail-cutting, keeping nails short is not always the easiest task.

Top Tips

Babies’ nails are much softer in their first few months and their tininess always makes judging where their nail quick and fingertip ends difficult. When babies are in their first months, they want to discover their hands and sharp nails risk scratches and harm to their skin. At this stage, it is recommended to file a baby’s nails as they are softer, but as they harden move onto safety clippers. To save tears over nipped fingers, it is recommended that you use sharp clippers that cut straight through the nail in one, quick clip. The STYLFILE Nipper Clipper is the first safety nail clipper for babies, to come with a spyhole that insures you never accidently cut into the skin. This provides you and your child with confidence that maintaining short and clean nails is an easy and harmless task!

Always cut straight across and then file the sides of the nail to ensure natural growth of the nail’s rotundity. The STYLFILE Nipper Clipper also comes with a baby S-File so you can gently shape the natural curve of your baby’s nail and encourage healthy growth. Avoid biting your baby’s nails as this introduces bacteria in your saliva to your child’s fingers, encouraging infection. Additionally, try not to tease the side of your baby’s nails or cut down the sides of their toenails; this may cause ingrown nails.

The other part of the battle in cutting little one’s nails, is getting them to sit still. It is best to trim their nails when they are calmer and distracted, whether this be putting something on the telly or simply talking to them. The STYLFILE Nipper Clipper comes with a free app, Timmy Tickle Baby, which offers colourful and engaging distraction for your child whilst you quickly clip their nails. The STYLFILE Nipper Clipper offers a quick and safe solution to the difficult task of trimming babies’ and toddler’s nails- ensuring clean hands and a clean household for all!