Beauty tips: Gel and nail enhancements on under 16s
This weeks beauty info is something I feel quite strongly about!
I see many young girls having their nails done and I always wonder if they or their parents know the effect it can have on younger nails.
So this weeks blog I want to address this and educate you on the effects on applying gel polish or nail enhancements to under 16s.
There is no legal age on nail services, but some places insurance could not cover anyone under 16, in other places doing a minor would require adult consent!
While there is no age limit the use of these of these products on young nails can damage them for life, and who wants that?
The nail plate of a child is undeveloped. It's is soft and full of moisture. The nail bed hasn't strengthened yet and the skin is still delicate.
If you were to put an enhancement on the nail bed of a child mostly likely they wouldn't be able to support the extension with the extra weight. The nails are small and soft to have something so heavy and thick on them. It's a lot to ask of something so weak.
The nail bed would need to be filed to create a key, this would mean thinning out an already immature thinned nail further. Plus how hard can it be to file something so small, adhesion could be bad.
Putting an extension would add further pressure on the nail bed. Even something as usual as scratching their head the nail bed wouldn't be able to support that pressure and the extension, which brings us on to accidents.
An accident forcing the extension up could rip the nail plate off the bed. This kind of damage at a young age could damage the matrix for life risking deformed nails.
Kids use their hands a lot to explore there is no getting away from that!
Lastly removal, depending on the system used, it could involve a lot filing to remove product which a young thin nail would not be able to cope with and could add movement of the nail plate, and what if you go to far?
If not then acetone could be used to remove, and do you want young delicate skin sitting in acetone for 15mins?
This post was written to draw your attention to some of the details you may not consider when your children ask for their nails to be done. A good look for 2weeks could damage their nails for life! Why not wait for their nails to mature?
If you or your children are quite insistant to have nice looking nails and normal polish isn't quite cutting it, CND Shellac could be a good one off alternative. No buffing of the nail is required at prep stage or removal. To remove the nails are wrapped in acetone for 5/10mins. The products are HEMA free monomers and they are hypo-allogenic. PLEASE NOTE these key features are not for all gel polish products, so you would need to check, quite a lot of other gel polishes still require filing at prep and removal stage.
