The Truth About Acrylic Nails
‘Gel doesn't damage your nails, but acrylic does’
How many times have you heard one of your friends say the above statement or have you said yourself?
It is completely false. Gel is a type of Acrylic (usually Methacrylate), as is liquid (Ethyl Methacrylate) & powder (a mix of Polyethyl Methacrylate and Polymethyl Methacrylate) and the resins (Ethyl Cyanoacrylate) used in silk or fibreglass and powdered acrylic extensions. The liquid & powder system is the one that is most commonly referred to as acrylic, but as stated above, they are all acrylics of some sort.
None of the acrylics above damage your nails. There are two main reasons why your nails may be damaged when your enhancements are removed. Either the technician applying them, removes more than just the surface shine so that your nails appear severely etched. Or when they are removed incorrectly i.e. picked, bitten or pulled off as this removes several layers of your nail along with the artificial one.
Methyl Methacrylate is a monomer (liquid) used in some nail enhancement applications and has stirred up some controversy over the past few years and is quickly becoming a problem in the UK.
MMA is extremely hard, and having it on your nails can cause you problems. When extreme force is applied to it and it breaks, usually your natural nail is torn apart. This can be permanent nail damage if near the matrix or lunula. Because MMA is so hard, the easiest way to file it is using an electric file.
You may now be sat there thinking ‘But if the nails are really strong, and I can go 4-6 weeks between rebalances, they must stick to the nails really well, right?’ No, wrong. In order for MMA to adhere to your nails, the nail plate must be serverely ‘roughed up’ or ‘etched’ so the topmost layers of the nail plate are removed. This exposes the middle layers of the nail plate, giving the MMA something substantial to hold on to. This etching process is repeated at rebalances and when replacing a nail, so before long, the nail plate becomes thin sheets of keratin that tear easily as well as offering no protection from MMA seeping through to the nail bed.
No professional supplier sells MMA as the liability of it is huge, just as no professional insured salon, homebased or mobile technician would use it. Chances are, if you can see a brand/company name on the container, it is very unlikely to be MMA.
Over the last few years, many states in the USA have banned the use of MMA monomers for use in nail applications. This trend will hopefully see all the states banning the product, and this will hopefully mean that the UK and other countries in Europe will follow suit.
You may now be wondering, what products the professionals use.
The safe alternative to MMA is Ethyl Methacrylate (EMA). It is strong, but unlike MMA it has a limitation on strength to ensure that if enough force is applied to the enhancement and it breaks, the natural nail underneath has little or no damage.
There has been nearly 3 decades of research that has gone into developing EMA for the nail industry and therefore offers the safest, most advanced option over MMA.
These are the most common signs that MMA is in use: