Mees’ lines are white lines or bands that appear in your fingernails or toenails. They can be a symptom of a serious health condition. The lines run across your nails (side to side, not up and down).
Should I be concerned about Mees’ lines?
However, anyone with Mees’ lines should visit a doctor, as they may signify a serious underlying medical condition or exposure to dangerous elements. Mees’ lines are named after Dutch physician R.A. Mees, who described the nail abnormality in 1919.
What is the difference between Muehrcke lines and Mees lines?
Muehrcke lines are easily distinguished from Mees lines because Muehrcke lines fade with digital compression (blood is squeezed from the vessels beneath the nail) and do not migrate with the growth of the nail 7).
How long do Mees lines take to appear?
Mees' lines (white lines in the nails) usually appear 2 to 3 weeks after acute exposure to arsenic. Arsenic intoxication should be considered in a patient with severe abdominal pain, dermatitis, painful peripheral neuropathy, and seizures. Click to see full answer. Also asked, do Mees lines grow out?
What are Mees lines in the nail?
Mees' lines (also known as Aldrich or Reynolds' lines) are transverse white bands on the nail plate laid down during periods of stress. Common associations are poisioning (arsenic, thallium, fluorosis), severe infection, renal disease, cardiac failure, and malignant disease. Mees' lines are indicative of systemic pathology ...
Why do Mees lines occur?
Causes. Mees' lines appear after an episode of poisoning with arsenic, thallium or other heavy metals or selenium, opioid MT-45, and can also appear if the subject is suffering from kidney failure. They have been observed in chemotherapy patients.
What causes Mees lines in fingernails?
Mees' lines (also known as Aldrich or Reynolds' lines) are transverse white bands on the nail plate laid down during periods of stress. Common associations are poisioning (arsenic, thallium, fluorosis), severe infection, renal disease, cardiac failure, and malignant disease.
When should I be worried about lines on my nails?
With age, vertical nail ridges may become more numerous or prominent because of changes in cell turnover within the nail. If your fingernails change color or you develop horizontal nail ridges, consult your health care provider. These changes could indicate an underlying health condition.
What poisons cause Mees lines?
Mees' Lines are a change that occurs in the color of the nail with no palpable ridges, typically described as white bands traversing the nail bed, running parallel to the lunula across the entire nail bed of the individual. This finding is indicative of arsenic [5], thallium [6], or other heavy metal poisoning.
Will Mees lines go away?
Mees' lines are white lines or bands that appear across the nails because of an underlying health condition. The symptom will go away if a doctor diagnoses and treats the underlying cause. If you have white lines in your fingernails or toenails, talk to a healthcare provider to be evaluated for poisoning or disease.
Do Muehrcke lines go away?
Treatment of Muehrcke's Lines The lines tend to go away when your albumin level returns to normal, or near normal.
What vitamin deficiency causes vertical lines in fingernails?
Our nails naturally develop slight vertical ridges as we age. However, severe and raised ridges can be a sign of iron deficiency anemia. Nutritional deficiencies, such as a lack of vitamin A, vitamin B, vitamin B12 or keratin can result in fingernail ridges.
Do thyroid problems cause nail ridges?
Horizontal ridges can be caused by trauma to the nail and may be deep or discolored. The can also indicate malnutrition, psoriasis or a thyroid problem. Check with your doctor if you see horizontal ridges on your nails; they may indicate a more serious problem. Need to make an appointment with a Piedmont physician?
What do Beau's lines in nails look like?
What do Beau's lines look like? Beau's lines are horizontal indentations, or ridges, that develop across the nails. They usually run straight across the nail. A person may develop one or more Beau's lines on any nail, or across multiple nails.
What metal is noted for causing Mees lines on the fingernails?
3 Mees' lines are prominent transverse white lines in finger or toe nails due to arsenic deposition in keratin rich tissues. They take some 3–6 weeks to manifest. The above mentioned skin changes are usually present in chronic arsenic toxicity, but can rarely be seen after acute or subacute exposures.
What are Covid nails?
COVID nails are nail changes that happen a few days or weeks after a COVID-19 infection. They're either a sign that the infection stressed your body, or they could be a rare symptom of the infection itself, depending on your symptoms.
Does lead poisoning affect fingernails?
This nail sign can appear after an episode of poisoning with arsenic, thallium, lead or other heavy metals, although they can also occur after physical injury to the nails, or in patients with renal failure and those on chemotherapy.
What is the difference between Beau's and Mees' lines?
Mees’ lines are different from Beau’s lines, which are deep ridges in the nail, and Muehrcke nails, the latter of which affects the vascular nail bed and creates lines that do not grow out when the nail lengthens .
What are the lines on the toenail called?
Mees’ Lines. Mees’ lines, a type of leukonychia striata that is also sometimes called Aldrich-Mees’ lines, are longitudinal white lines on a fingernail or toenail that run parallel to the nail’s lunula (the crescent shaped white area that appears at the bed of the nail).
Do Mees lines grow out on their own?
Mees’ lines will eventually grow out on their own, so there’s no need for treatment of the lines themselves. However, anyone with Mees’ lines should visit a doctor, as they may signify a serious underlying medical condition or exposure to dangerous elements.
What are Mees lines associated with?
Mees lines are classically associated with arsenic poisoning 12) . If arsenic poisoning is suspected, hair or tissue samples should be obtained for verification; the timing of the arsenic poisoning can be estimated based on the rate of nail plate growth 13). However, Mees’ lines also may be associated with multiple other conditions such as thallium or other heavy metal poisoning 14), Hodgkin lymphoma or Hodgkin’s disease, congestive heart failure, renal failure, carcinoid tumors, chemotherapy (i.e., cyclophosphamide, vincristine and doxorubicin), leprosy, malaria, carbon monoxide poisoning and other systemic insults 15).
What is a Mees line?
Mees lines also called “true leukonychia”, leukonychia striata or transverse leukonychia, are a change that occurs in the color of the nail with no palpable ridges, typically described as transverse non-blanching white bands that may extend the complete width of the nail plate, running parallel to the lunula across ...
How are Muehrcke lines different from Mees lines?
Muehrcke lines are easily distinguished from Mees lines because Muehrcke lines fade with digital compression (blood is squeezed from the vessels beneath the nail) and do not migrate with the growth of the nail 7).
Why do Mees lines migrate?
Mees lines migrate toward the distal end of the nail plate over time because the abnormality is in the nail plate and not the nail bed. Mees lines are classically associated with arsenic poisoning 2) .
Why do mees lines run parallel to the nail bed?
In Mees lines (true leukonychia) the transverse, non-blanching white bands appear that run parallel to the lunula across the entire nail bed are caused by an insult to the distal nail matrix that does not lead to cessation in growth of the matrix , but instead causes parakeratosis of the ventral nail plate 16).
Who is the doctor who described the Mees line?
Although, there were earlier descriptions of this abnormality made by Reynolds in 1901 [2] and Aldrich in 1904 [3]; this anatomical abnormality is named after the Dutch physician Mees, who described them in 1919 [4]. Mees’ Lines are a change that occurs in the color of the nail with no palpable ridges, typically described as white bands traversing the nail bed, running parallel to the lunula across the entire nail bed of the individual.
What are the lines on the fingernails?
Mees lines are transverse lines that appear in the fingernails and toenails, although they are not specific for arsenic poisoning.
Why do Mees lines appear?
Causes. Mees' lines appear after an episode of poisoning with arsenic, thallium or other heavy metals or selenium, and can also appear if the subject is suffering from kidney failure.
What are the white lines on the toes called?
Mees' lines or Aldrich–Mees lines, also called leukonychia striata, are white lines of discoloration across the nails of the fingers and toes ( leukonychia ).
