Several years ago, during a routine checkup, my primary-care doctor pointed to some white lines on my right foot. (Curiously only one foot had them.) Fungus, he said. I had a fungus infection. What should I do? I asked. He suggested over-the-counter anti-foot-fungus medications, sold in every drugstore.
I tried a few of them. They didn’t work. The problem persisted.
A month ago I noticed the problem had gotten much worse. Yikes. What had gone wrong? I realized that in the previous few weeks I had changed two things:
- Instead of putting my wash through an extra wash cycle without soap (to rinse it better), I had started doing my wash the way the rest of the world does it. I had stopped doing the extra cycle because I was no longer worried about becoming allergic to the soap.
- I had bought 5 new pairs of socks and had been cycling though 4 of the new pairs again and again (washing them between wearings, of course), ignoring the rest of my socks.
This suggested a theory: My skin infection was due to my socks. The infectious agents get on my socks and are not completely removed by the washing machine. They survive a few days on the shelf. To wear socks with the infectious agent already present gives the infection a boost. Maybe my new socks supported the infectious agent better than the socks they replaced.
Based on this theory, I did three things:
- Resumed putting my wash through an extra cycle without soap.
- Took off my socks earlier in the evening.
- Bought 12 new pairs of socks and made sure every sock went a long time (e.g., 3 weeks) between wearings.
I saw improvement right away. (The morning after I wore new socks.) A month later, the infection, present for at least several years, is entirely gone. It took about a month for it to clear up completely.
The essence of my discovery is that the infectious agent could survive my socks being washed conventionally (in a washing machine) and live for a few days without contact with my feet. Whereas a few weeks away from my skin killed it. I have been unable to find this info anywhere else. A very minor discovery, but unlike the work that won the most recent Nobel Prize in Medicine, useful right now. Cost: zero. I would have had to buy new socks anyway.
In Cities and the Wealth of Nations, Jane Jacobs tells about a reporter interviewing someone in an oil-rich Middle East country (Iran?). During the interview the interviewee tries to cut an apple with a knife. The knife breaks. We can’t even make knives, the interviewee says. That’s how backward our economy is. To develop economically, MIT professors had advised his country’s government to build a dam, at great expense. The MIT advisors thought that building a dam would be good for economic development. They were wrong, it turned out. Jacobs thought it was telling that after all that money invested, the local economy still couldn’t make something as basic as a good knife. Many industrial processes require cutting tools.
This is the same thing. Preventing and eliminating infection is at the core of medicine, just as cutting is at the core of manufacturing. My discovery reveals that my doctor — and by implication, the whole health care establishment — failed to know something basic and simple about this. If they understood what I figured out, there would be no need for anti-foot-fungus medicine. A gazillion dollars a year is spent on medical research, medical schools and research institutes around the world are full of faculty doing research — and they haven’t figured out something as basic and simple as this.
Gatekeeper Drugs. How to Avoid Infection: Something I Didn’t Know.
I noticed that curing myself of foot fungal problems consisted of 2 things:
1: Wearing new “breathable” shoes every 3-6 months
must have been a very rare form of fungus.
for 99% of all forms, lamisil kills them in very short time (sometimes they’re completely gone after a week).
You could also try dampening your socks and tossing them in the microwave for a minute before putting them in the wash. That will probably kill the nasties dead dead dead dead.
All the anti-fungal stuff I’ve used also says to change clothing to prevent reinfection. E.g. https://mydr.com.au/medicines/cmis/daktarin-cream
* Keep a separate face washer and towels for your own use to avoid infecting other people.
* Regularly change clothing, which comes into contact with the infected areas to avoid reinfecting yourself.
* Clean the site of infection twice daily to prevent build up of fungal cells.
* Keep the areas of infection well ventilated. Do not apply moisturisers to the site of infection as this will promote the growth of fungus. If infection involves the feet, footwear that make the feet perspire should be avoided.
My late model washing machine has a “sanitize” cycle that heats the water to some much higher than normal temp. It takes almost 2 hours, most of which is spent in that hot water, best I can tell.
James, I’d heard all that. I did all that. It was unhelpful. What really helped was waiting long enough before wearing the same sock again. Which isn’t on that list.
Seth, in medieval times people used to iron their clothing and bedspread to sanitize them – maybe ironing your socks would have helped, too?
Sam, it is much easier to do nothing than to iron.
Interesting thread and I must try it out.
Aaron-what was the second thing that helped?
I have a Samsung washing machine that has a “silver ion” mode. It supposedly uses a bar of silver and runs an electrolysis cycle to generate silver ions.
I wonder if using that mode would be equal in effectiveness to the long cycle time you discovered.
Hey, the same thing happened to me. I tried all sorts of different over-the-counter antifungals which seemed to reduce but not completely eliminate the infection. This problem persisted for a couple of years I think. Then I noticed that it was worse when I had been wearing certain socks. I bought a lot more of the kind of socks that did not worsen it and started going barefoot frequently and changing socks frequently. Problem solved!
n = 2
Seth,
A version of your trick works for sandal odor too. I noticed that when I had one only pair of sandals, as the summer, sandal odor would become harder and harder to control. Scrubbing with “Paxton’s Sandal Saver” didn’t even help. Then I realized that since I wore them so frequently in the summer, the bacteria colony never had time do die off. So I bought a second pair of sandals and started rotating them. Now, no odor problem.
If there’s a “Sock and Sandal Retailers Association of America” they might be interested in funding some more formal research on this subject since it would certainly drive sales for them. Of course the Lamsil people and the people who make the fancy germ killing heat cycle washing machines would team up to try to discredit the research
David
Sample size of 1. No control. Not double blind. Not even single blind. Even worse, the subject was the one trying to prove the hypothesis…
You can’t seriously think you’ve proved anything here. Come on. Imagine what it would be like if the medical establishment switched over to your method of ‘medical research’. “Common cold cured! Local man says ‘I eat a tree root, and my cold cleared up within 3 days!’”…
It’s not even as if you’d *need* a proper medical trial to establish something like whether fungus on socks survives washing; just a few socks, a few breeds of fungus, a washing machine, and a microscope.
Finally, what makes you so sure this *isn’t* known? Thousands of medical studies are published every month; how many do you think your doctor reads? Getting information about medical research to front-line doctors is a huge problem and a known problem, and one that a lot of resources are going into.
Finally finally… Err, the fact that a normal washing cycle won’t remove a lot of pathogens *is* well known. E.g. the standard recommendations for soiled hospital laundry are “…the temperature of light laundry loads (i.e. those below 560 grams per litre of main wash) are maintained at 65°C (150°F) for not less than 14 minutes or preferably at 71°C (160°F) for not less than 7 minutes. In order to assure disinfection an additional “mixing time” of 8 minutes should be added to these times for loads above 560 grams per litre.” (Source: UK NHS executive).
It’s not like this is some obscure thing that’s kept from doctors. “Heat kills pathogens” is pretty damn well known (hence Sam (above)’s pointing out that traditional folk advice about ironing socks. You omitted to say at what temperature you were washing your socks.
“Proved”? I found an easy free way to get rid of an infection that I had been trying to get rid of for years. And that medications are sold for. I had no idea that my socks were causing trouble — nor did my doctor suggest that possibility — so I saw no reason to care how I washed them (in cold water). My point is not that “heat kills pathogens”. My point is that a few weeks at room temperature kills the pathogen responsible in this case. If you can find a citation for this knowledge please let me know. I have been unable to find one.
How do you label or otherwise distinguish your socks?
I spread my socks out on a shelf. I put the freshly-washed ones on the far right (pushing the rest over a little) and take the ones I will wear from the far left.
Hi all. I discover something like that but to prevent bad odor on feet. 1. Have a bunch of socks [normally white-colored ones] 2. Wash them using machine but adding some some chlorine [we name it “Clorox”] 3. Of course, use a fresh pair everyday, no matter if one pair looks “clean” 4. I always use flips-flops at home. I have never had feet fungus on my life.
I spread my socks out on a shelf. I put the freshly-washed ones on the far right (pushing the rest over a little) and take the ones I will wear from the far left.
I’ve done things like that.
I noticed something similar to this two times I took a long vacation. I had fewer than usual number of socks and underwear, and by the end of the month, I had a fungus infection.
With a more normal number of each in the rotation (approximately double), I don’t have such a problem.
I knew it was related to clothing, but I thought it was related to the change in washing style due to being away from home, not the number of garments available.
I’m going to try the labeled slots for inventory,
Thanks!
“My discovery reveals that my doctor — and by implication, the whole health care establishment — failed to know something basic and simple about this.”
“A gazillion dollars a year is spent on medical research… and they haven’t figured out something as basic and simple as this.”
Not shy of making bold claims eh Seth? Let’s gloss over the fact that the spores of such skin fungi (dermatophytes) can live for months even years… (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dermatophyte). Instead, let us concentrate on the fact that you may simply have stumbled across regression to the mean (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regression_toward_the_mean), a phenomenon that those researchers you were so quick to belittle know well.
Same applies for your transient-eye-infection-goes-away-after-changing-pillowcase “experiment”
Hate to say it, but for a blog about self-experimentation and scientific method you seem a little, um, weak on the basics…!
Perhaps I might humbly suggest some homework next time you feel like slagging the medical and research professions? https://www.badscience.net/
It’s not regression to the mean. When you have a problem for several years, it stays roughly constant over that time, an incidental observation suggests trying X, you try X, the problem goes away within days — that’s not regression to the mean. Do you have another alternative explanation of what I observed?
I could have a thousand alternative explanations – and you could have a thousand rebuttals – that’s not really the point. The point is that your post is post hoc ergo propter hoc reasoning https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post_hoc_ergo_propter_hoc based on a single observation, does not establish [and, importantly, cannot EVER] establish a causal link between your new sock regime and the clearing of your foot infection. (BTW, I am pleased to hear it cleared up, whatever the actual cause)
PS. regression to the mean of a naturally time-limited complaint still seems a likely explanation to me.
Very cool. I’ll have to keep that in mind. I go through phases of having fungal infections, the next time around I’ll watch which socks I’m using!
Puffin, it isn’t regression to the mean. My observations were a single time series (several times/day for several years), not “a single observation.” You seem to be saying that a single time series “cannot EVER establish a causal link”. I would love to see evidence for that.
Puffin, what do you mean by “establish”? It seems pretty suggestive to me.
I’m interested in hearing your suggestions for an equally compelling explanation (much less 1,000 of them!).
I.e., why do you think it’s equally compelling to say it’s coincidence?
@ Seth:
You promote yourself as a man of science, https://sethroberts.org/about/ yet you apparently fail to understand that multiple measurements (“several times/day for several years”) on THE SAME PERSON, mean that you still only have information from a single person. To illustrate, if my mum says 1000 times that I am a good-looking lad (thanks mum), it alas, does not have the same weight as if 1000 independent people say it (which, to date sadly, they have not).
Secondly, for someone so apparently evidence-based (“I would love to see evidence for that” you say), you provide none to back your own key assertions – for example: (1) “it isn’t regression to the mean” (the onus is on you my friend to demonstrate this, not me – I just have to call it); or (2) “a few weeks at room temperature kills the pathogen responsible” (did you check that the microscopic fungal spores had died, or do you just assume they did because you can’t see them with your eyes and the infection went away?).
@ Anthony:
Why do I believe that the more likely explanation is chance? Well, coincidences happen all the time. Literally millions (?billions) of people on this good planet have fungal foot infections. At any one time, probably many thousands of these infections are clearing up (as most minor ailments do). In all of these cases the getting better might coincidentally follow a change in behavior. For Seth it was his socks… for someone else it might be eating an extra apple a day. Who knows? Humans are good at seeing patterns, but poor at recognizing randomness (eg, the iPod shuffle feature seeming to have favorites https://preview.tinyurl.com/y99yo8e ). For this reason, eliminating the reasonable doubt that your observation might simply be a coincidence is the first step towards “establishing causality” (apologies for the jargon).
To better support his claims, Seth would therefore have to demonstrate that in all likelihood the sock regime was the only reason the infection went away, and that the improvement didn’t happen simply because it was going to anyway or because of some other unknown factor that has instead mistakenly been ascribed to the power of the sock. This requires much more rigorous evidence than Seth currently provides. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causality
The little evidence Seth does provide is known as a case report (ie, an observation from a single person) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Case_report
Although they are one of the least persuasive forms of medical evidence, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evidence-based_medicine case reports CAN (as you correctly stated) help SUGGEST new ideas. In most medical research (which after all, is the field that Seth was mocking when he crowed “they haven’t figured out something as basic and simple as thisâ€), the gold-standard for proving causality is a randomized controlled trial involving many people (ranging from hundreds to tens of thousands – many more than here!)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randomized_controlled_trial
Lastly, please note that despite my ongoing skepticism, Seth may well be proved right (and good luck to him). ‘Sock rotation’ (copyright, puffin 2009-eternity) may indeed be the cure to fungal foot infections. All I am saying is that the evidence that he currently provides falls woefully short of being sufficient to justify his pompous and arrogant claims to have “figured out” something that doctors with their “gazillion dollars a year” have failed to do so.
If you’re interested in learning more, I highly suggest reading Dr Ben Goldacre’s excellent book: https://amzn.com/B002BIMNDQ
Puffin, I asked for evidence because I was trying to understand why you believe what you do. I agree, I should have made it sound less argumentative. You have been kind enough to read my blog and comment on it, I am trying to learn from your comments. Let me try to get at the same goal a different way: Where does your understanding of regression to the mean come from?
I’ve tried those over the counter creams, and no, they don’t work. The ones I get from my doctor work within a day.
I think the over the counter stuff is just so diluted that they are essentially placebos. Sock rotation may also work, but if you really want to get rid of it, go to a dermatologist.
I ran into the problem of athlete’s foot (foot fungus) a few years ago and went about searching for the cure. The cause and the cure are closely related: moisture. The reason you get foot fungus in the first place is because the fungus gets into your skin and proceeds to eat the dead skin off your foot. the burning itch is the fungus trying to grow into your dermal layers. This typically happens when you have damp feet all the time. The fungus needs moist conditions to live and thrive in.
The best practical cure to athlete’s foot is to change into fresh dry socks any time your feet feel sweaty or humid. After you get out of the shower, take a hot air dryer to your feet to dry out the skin between your toes. If your feet are dry, the fungus can’t grow. Sweaty feet and poor changes of socks result in athlete’s foot, so dry feet and fresh socks is the easiest solution.
For me, sprays, cremes, and powders didn’t work. It was fresh dry socks that eventually made the itching go away. Haven’t had a problem since.