What you may already know: your fingernails can tell you tons about your health. Weak and brittle? Your thyroid is probably playing up. White spots all over? You’re likely deficient in zinc. Chances are, however, you don’t already know that your nails can help detect one of the earliest signs of lung cancer: clubbing.
According to the Mayo Clinic, this condition occurs when the tops of the fingers or toes enlarge, causing the nail to curve around them. To date, there’s no known cause, although it’s believed that chronic illnesses trigger low oxygen in the blood, which results in a change in the curvature of the nail bed.
There’s an easy way to tell if it’s happened to you.
Start by taking the ‘Schamroth’s window’ test, which involves pushing the tips of your index fingers together to see whether or not a diamond-shaped patch of light shows through.
“Most people with lung cancer don’t know that their fingers are clubbing unless they know specifically to look out for it. But the Schamroth window test is a really easy way to check for potential underlying conditions,” oncology nurse Emma Norton explained in an interview with Huffington Post.
“The test is used by medical professionals as a partial method of confirming conditions, but you can also do the test yourself – and it only takes a few seconds.”
For the record, clubbing can also be a symptom of other conditions, including pulmonary fibrosis, mesothelioma, Crohn’s disease and colitis.
Noticed this symptom? It’s important to speak to your doctor as soon as possible. Early detection is key!
Yay I have diamonds!
Oh good, clubbing. Another scary symptom to worry about. Eeeek!
Oh wow that’s good to know!
Interesting. I just know that my nails are normal.
Interesting as I have colitis.
That’s very interesting
Some of my fingernails are clubbed, especially my middle fingers, but I’ve got a few issues going on so it’s not surprising really.
I have a diamond but its rather small….even so its there.
It would be helpful if they included a photo of clubbed fingers
Very small diamonds present…
Good to know this
I adore you BH Team, but I think without sharing very clear parameters and wording it’s dangerous to encourage people to self-diagnose/watch out for things that may or may not mean what they might mean. It can cause tremendous amounts of stress in people who already have anxiety, especially while so many of us are already not feeling able to ask for the normal amount of preventative/diagnostic medical care due to a pandemic.
It’s actually hard to find a clear example of what the window test should and definitely shouldn’t look like (i.e. the difference between healthy and possibly problematic is extremely minor) and even if there is clubbing happening, it could still be caused by a wide variety of issues.
Again, I adore you guys. I just think it’s very easy to unintentionally spread fear and stress without much payoff. It would be better if it was presented with clear images of what your fingers should and shouldn’t look like – and with a clear note that it is not a singular diagnostic tool, but something that may warrant you seeing your GP for further testing.
This is a tough subject.
I’ve learnt something new..
Yes, the article is badly worded. I had to Google Schamroth’s window test to make sense of the article.
Thank you for your comment! I thought I had cancer for a moment when I could easily make the diamond. There definitely needs to be a clear picture of what clubbing looks like, and to say that the pictured diamond is normal.
I find these types of articles to be like the “Which —- character are you” quizes – a bit of entertainment if the result is what you want, but ultimately a waste of time. If this was a screening tool, why has no doctor ever asked me to put my index fingers together to see if they make a diamond? For that matter, no doctor has ever asked to see my fingers. If it was so easy to diagnose (or at least explore the existence of) a serious condition simply by the shape of one’s fingers, I’d imagine it would ease the workload of many GPs. But something (call it common sense) tells me it’s not that straightforward.
Thank you, Nell. This is actually a very important point.
This is a good read