Does Biotin Help Nails Grow

Does Biotin Really Work

All right, lets cut to it: The simple truth is that theres not enough scientific proof that biotin is the key to growing your hair really, really long. While, in the past, there was belief biotin supplements were needed to grow strong and healthy hair, there is actually little evidence that it makes much of a difference, Dr. Bhanusali says. Most dermatologists tend to agreewhile it likely doesnt hurt, taking biotin may not make much of a difference in your hair.

And remember how I said biotin was water soluble? What that means is any excess amount of it in your system gets flushed out through your urine, so loading up on biotin wont give you great results, unfortunately. Biotin can only impact hair growth if there is an existing biotin deficiency, Hill adds. Taking extra biotin supplements does not lead to extra nutrient-based hair growth.

Precautions Of Using Biotin For Hair Growth

Although you get a positive answer to the question “Does biotin help hair grow?” there are some precautions you must know. Biotin is usually safe for most people however, you may want to talk to your doctor before you start taking biotin supplements if you already have an underlying condition. Here are some other things to bear in mind when taking these supplements:

• You may develop jaw line and chin cystic acne after supplementing with biotin. Be sure to drink plenty of water and limit biotin dosage to 2500 mcg or less.
• You may develop allergic reactions while supplementing with biotin. It is quite rare, but can happen. Be sure to seek medical attention if you experience symptoms such as nausea, itchy rashes, chest pain, and a swollen face and throat.
• In rare cases, large doses of biotin may lead to miscarriage. Talk to your doctor if you are pregnant and want to take biotin.
• You may notice negative medicinal interactions if you take biotin when you are already taking medications for seizures, cholesterol and diabetes.

Moisturizers Help Maintain Nail Length: True

Keeping your nails moist won’t help them grow quicker, but it can keep them from breaking sooner.

“As we get into fall and winter when the air is much drier, nails crack and split more easily and therefore stay short,” Kleinsmith says. “Our nails need lubrication, just like our hands and skin, during the winter months. Every time you wash your hands, put a little hand cream on it’s much richer and thicker than just a body lotion.”

Wear gloves or mittens outdoors in cold weather, and use rubber gloves when you’re doing chores around the house.

“Once nails come out from under the cuticle, they’re dead tissue, so there’s no way to repair it,” Robinson says. “Detergents and dish soap can make the nails dry and split. Wear cotton-lined rubber gloves around any soaps or cleansers, even if you’re only washing one dish or one window.”

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What Happens When You Stop Taking Biotin

Our bodies use biotin quickly, immediately once it is consumed, and it is not stored in the body. Therefore, any benefit you receive from taking biotin will quickly reverse once you stop taking it for a few days. If you find that biotin is helpful for hair growth or slowing hair thinning, you will need to make it a part of your daily routine indefinitely.

Where To Get Biotin For Your Hair

You can get biotin from different sources, including supplements and food.

1. Biotin Supplements

Biotin supplements for hair growth are quite popular. You can find them in many different forms, including the following:

• Pills: They are the most popular type of biotin supplement. Several brands of biotin pills are now available and most of them work well for most individuals. You may opt for other supplement types if you have problems with digesting or swallowing supplements in capsule or pill form. Liquid capsules as well as soft and hard gel capsules are also available today.
• Oil: You can also find biotin supplements in oil form. You have to apply the oil directly to your scalp to get positive results.
• Shampoo: Many hair products, such as conditioners, shampoos, and hair oils contain biotin and are quite suitable for unhealthy hair. Shampoos that contain biotin provide your hair with beneficial amino acids, which help improve circulation and repair damage as well.

2. Food Rich in Biotin

While supplements really help get the amount of biotin you need to get healthy hair, you do not have to rely on supplements alone. You can include certain food in your diet to provide your body with enough biotin.

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How Much Biotin Is Recommended For Hair Growth

Now that you know your answer to, “Does biotin help hair grow?” you may want to know how much to take to see some improvement. Some studies have confirmed that taking biotin does not lead to any side effects even if you are taking up to 300,000mcg a day. However, there is no reason to consume more when you can have it in moderate quantities to produce positive results. Depending on your age, you should keep the following dosage guidelines in mind.

These are basic guidelines, but many people take up to 1000mcg of biotin a day for faster and healthier hair growth. Some evidence suggests that taking 5000mcg of biotin every day for up to 3 months may help you have thicker and longer hair. You can find biotin in 10, 50, and 100 micrograms tablets.

Does Biotin Make Nails Grow Faster

“You can’t hurry your nails, which grow at a fixed rate of about a millimeter a month,” says dermatologist Bruce Robinson, MD, of Lenox Hill Hospital in New York. However, if biotin can decrease nail splitting and increase nail thickness, it might appear that nails are growing faster because they are not breaking off as quickly.

Biotin and other B-complex vitamins are not the only supplements linked to healthy nails. Deficiencies in a number of essential minerals can also lead to unhealthy nails that may be brittle, dry, or break easily. A good multivitamin with adequate amounts of B vitamins , plus minerals may help nails to be stronger. If you think your fingernails appear unhealthy, be sure to ask a dermatologist or doctor to look at them. Unhealthy nails may be an indication of an underlying health condition that needs to be addressed.

Melissa Zimmerman, Healthy Goods

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The Science Behind Biotin And Nails

To date, there isn’t enough scientific evidence to rate the effectiveness of biotin in treatment of brittle nails, according to the National Institutes of Health . However, studies have definitively shows that biotin deficiency does cause brittle nails. Therefore, supplementation of the vitamin in these cases is helpful for nail strength.

How Much To Take

To make sure that you are getting enough biotin daily, these are the recommendations:

• From birth to 12 months:7mcg
• From 1 to 3 years:8mcg
• From 4 to 8 years:12mcg
• From 9 to 13 yearsrs:20mcg
• From 14 to 18 years:25mcg
• Over age 18:30mcg

In addition to the biotin supplement you should do the following:

• Minimize water exposure to your nails.
• Use gloves when doing dishes, cleaning, and handling wet laundry.
• Use alcohol gel sanitizers when possible
• Constant wetting and drying of your nails leads to dehydration that worsens weak, brittle nails.
• Apply moisturizer, such as Eucerin Hand Crème, to your nails as well as your hands.
• Use a moisturizer every time you wash your hands.

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Biotin Hair Care Products

There are lots of shampoos out there containing biotin that also claim to boost hair growth. These products often claim that applying biotin topically will do better for your hair than ingesting it as a supplement. The idea is that biotin can strengthen the hair follicle, which therefore will result in healthier hair growing out. The shampoos advertise themselves as remedies for brittle or thinning hair. According to WebMD, there is no evidence that biotin added to topical hair care products works, however, and they recommend a diet rich in natural biotin sources to boost hair health.

Some popular shampoos containing biotin are certain lines of Matrix Biolage, Olapex, and even the drugstore brand Pantene ProV.

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When you’re in Chipsville after a manicure, sometime you just want a magic pill to pull you out of your short nail rut. Though many cry foul on any forms of supplements or vitamins proposed to help with nail growth, Dr. Stern notes that “of all the supplements there is the most evidence in the medical literature that biotin is beneficial for nail health.”

The only catch? It’s not for the impatient. “Nails are slow growing and it is recommended that you take Biotin for at least four months in order to see a benefit for the fingernails and nine months for the toenails. Biotin is water soluble and therefore what your body doesn’t need will be eliminated unlike certain vitamins that can be stored in the body’s fat.”

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What Factors Help Nail Growth

As well as finding ways to encourage grow nails fast, there are also things you can do to avoid harming them.

Exposing your nails to water can lead to breakages, so try to wear gloves when you are doing housework or immersing your hands for anything other than washing them.

You may also find that hand sanitiser, detergent and other cleaning products can be harmful to your nails, so protect them where you can and keep them moisturised.

It is not the easiest problem to solve, but the climate you live in, also impacts on your nail growth.

Your general health will always impact on the growth of your nails.

If your body is lacking something vital, or has other health concerns, it can affect the natural processes such as nail growth. So, for tip top nails, you need tip top health.

Make sure you look at what your body might be lacking and see what natural sources can provide it for you or turn to a supplement.

This not only means that your nails will grow but your overall health will also improve, which has got to be a good thing!

Supplement Dosage And Rda Of Vitamin B7

Most healthy adults meet biotin requirements through a well-balanced diet. Keep in mind that in supplement form, common biotin dosages range from 1,000 micrograms to 10,000 micrograms, which is much higher than your daily recommended value, or the amount considered to be an adequate intake.

Recommended daily allowances of biotin have not been established due to a lack of sufficient evidence. According to the National Institutes of Health, the Adequate Intake to obtain biotin benefits for different age groups is as follows:

• 5 micrograms daily for infants
• 68 micrograms daily for infants ages 7 months to 3 years old
• 1220 micrograms daily for children ages 413 years old
• 25 micrograms for adolescents
• 30 micrograms for male and female adults over 19 years old
• 30 milligrams for pregnant women and 35 milligrams for women who are breastfeeding

How much biotin should you take for hair growth? The proper dosage depends on a few factors, including your age and whether or not you have a biotin deficiency.

When it comes to using biotin benefits for hair loss/to promote growth, you can start by taking 1,0000 mcg of biotin daily and increasing the amount of biotin foods you consume in a day. A general recommendation is try working your way up to taking about 2.5 to 3 mg daily, which will cover your needs and then some.

According to an article that appeared in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, some underlying causes of biotin deficiency include:

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Faq: Biotin For Hair Loss

Do biotin supplements for hair loss work? Symptoms of biotin deficiency can include skin rashes, hair loss, and brittle nails, which is one reason so many people believe that biotin supplements can have a positive effect. However, there are only a few studies to support those claims so far. The National Institutes of Health states that there need to be further studies to determine the true efficacy of supplementation for improving hair, nail, and skin health among healthy people.

That being said, anecdotal evidence abounds, and biotin supplements for hair loss are extremely popular. SPYs Site Director Tim Werth, who takes his hair very seriously, says that he has personally witnessed biotin supplements lead to less hair in the shower drain and fuller, thicker hair.

How much biotin should you take? The recommended dosage for adult women is 25 mcg and for adult men 30 mcg. There isnt currently data that states how much the typical American consumes other western populations average about 3570 mcg daily. Biotin is only beneficial if you have a true biotin deficiency however, that is rare, says Yates. Taking biotin in excess of the bodys needs doesnt appear to be harmful because the body eliminates what it doesnt need if taking a supplement, he says.

What Vitamins Help Your Fingernails

First of all, supplements encompass more than just vitamins. You might see people use the terms interchangeably, but supplements are defined, by law, as products that are ingested and meant to, well, supplement or add to your diet. These products include vitamins, minerals, herbs, and nutrients, says Heather Hawthorne, MD, family practice physician at Doctor on Demand. So just to recap, vitamins are actually a type of supplement.

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Preventing And Treating Dry Skin

Dry skin often means that the nails are also dry. Very dry skin can even crack open and bleed, exposing the nails to fungal and bacterial infections.

When the skin surrounding the nail bed or nail matrix is dry, it could damage the nails as they grow.

To prevent dry skin, moisturize hands and nails during the winter months and apply lotion after washing hands. People who have eczema should choose eczema-friendly creams that are highly moisturizing.

Using Biotin For Nail Growth

While some research suggests that biotin may help treat brittle nails, there’s not yet enough evidence to draw any firm conclusions about the benefits of using biotin supplements for healthier nails. To get your fill of biotin without using supplements, include biotin-rich foods like liver, salmon, pork chop, hamburger, bananas, carrots, egg yolks, sardines, and sweet potatoes in your diet.

Although biotin deficiency is uncommon, it may occur in people who drink alcohol excessively or consume a great deal of raw egg white . Genetic disorder of biotin deficiency, infant seborrheic dermatitis, and surgical removal of the stomach may also increase your need for biotin. Symptoms of biotin deficiency include thinning of the hair, a red scaly rash , depression, exhaustion, hallucinations, and tingling of the arms and legs.

Brittle nails are often a normal result of the aging process. However, nail brittleness can sometimes signal an underlying health problem . Symptoms of brittle nails include frequent and/or easy tearing, cracking, splitting, or breaking of nails. If you have brittle nails, it’s important to consult your healthcare provider rather than self-treating your nails with biotin supplements. Self-treating a condition and avoiding or delaying standard care may have serious consequences.

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Other Benefits Of Biotin

Although more research is needed to assess its effects on hair growth, biotin does have several proven benefits.

For example, biotin is one of several B vitamins that support a healthy metabolism. Biotin converts glucose from carbohydrates into energy for the body and aids amino acids in carrying out normal bodily functions.

Biotin is also thought to:

• reduce inflammation

Avoid Using Nails As Tools

The role of the nails is to protect the soft skin underneath them. It is not a good idea to use them as tools to get things done.

A person can easily break or chip their nail if they use them to open a can, for example. So to protect nails, try using a flat object or the pads of the fingers to pry it open.

Not using nails as tools can help prevent damage and improve nail strength.

Shorter nails are less likely to become damaged. When a person has very long nails, they are more likely to break, chip, crack, or catch on something and rip off.

Keeping nails trimmed can help avoid accidental breakages and maintain their strength.

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Are There Any Side Effects To Taking Biotin

Taking too much biotin can have negative effects, says Dr. Levitan. It can skew the results of certain blood tests, for one, leading to misdiagnoses. It can also interfere with the absorption of other B vitamins which are essential to other important aspects of health, she adds. Thats why she recommends those with thinning hair dont supplement with more than 2500 mcgs a day.

Why Biotin Isn’t A Miracle Hair

• Biotin does help with hair growth as long as you have a biotin deficiency.

• Signs of a biotin deficiency include fatigue, loss of hair, and brittle nails.

• Chat with your doctor about the right dosage, which is typically around 5 mg per day.

Biotin is a popular vitamin supplement often marketed for its ability to grow healthy hair, skin, and nails. However, there is limited research on the relationship between biotin and hair. And, of the limited studies, most indicate biotin only thickens and lengthens hair if you have a biotin deficiency.

Here is what you need to know about biotin, its relationship to healthy hair, and possible side effects.

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