Pedicure Disinfectants - Alcohol and Isopropyl

Alcohols, usually ethanol or isopropanol derivatives are considered to be wide-spectrum disinfectants meaning that it is effective in sterilizing substances or materials against a large number of microbes.

For the purposes of pedicures and manicures, alcohol is almost a necessity when it comes to cleaning manicure and pedicure equipment. I personally recommend that the use of 70% alcohol for the sterilization of manicure and pedicure equipment such as nail clippers and scissors isn’t enough. Alcohol has very good microbiocidal however isn’t effective against dangerous viruses like HIV. Rather a combination of disinfectants that can effectively kill these dangerous viruses should be used.

Alcohol should however be used to wipe over benches and skin and allowed to evaporate for quick disinfection. It is effective to disinfect surfaces or materials that don’t come into direct contact with the human flesh or have the possibility of cross infecting any clients.

The benefits for Alcohol are that it has a wide microbiocidal activity range and are non- corrosive. They also have limited residual activity due to evaporation, and have a limited activity in the presence of organic material. On the other hand, stored Alcohol is highly flammable and storing large amounts normally requires licensing and special storage methods which could be troublesome.

The trick with using Alcohol is that it is more useful if it is combined with a certain percentage of water, for example, 70% alcohol is more effective than 95% alcohol. It should also be noted that Alcohol is not effective against fungal or bacterial spores.