Corns and Calluses Between the Fourth and Fifth Toes: What Is the Exact Cause?

What is the exact cause of corns, calluses, and warts that develop on the sides of and between the fourth and fifth toes?

A patient who visited our clinic with corns and calluses between the fourth and fifth toes.

Although the patient had been receiving corn treatment at another clinic, the pain between the toes while walking was so severe that it caused cries of pain.

His wife searched for a corn specialist clinic on Naver and found Gangnam Standard Orthopedics.

The patient had been undergoing combined laser and injection treatment at another clinic for three weeks prior, but the pain had actually worsened, making the corn and callus treatment a failure.

Without identifying the exact cause of corns and calluses between the toes, treatments such as laser therapy, cryotherapy, and injections at other clinics are bound to fail, and the corns and calluses will keep recurring.

For toe corns and calluses — including those between the toes — accurately identifying the underlying cause is essential.

That is why our clinic does not diagnose based solely on the skin surface. Accurate diagnosis is our top priority.

Characteristics of patients with toe and inter-toe corns and calluses:

Because corns and calluses on or between the toes look so small to others who have never experienced them,

people may think it is nothing serious — but those who have experienced them consistently say:

"The pain is truly unbearable!"

As a clinic specializing in corns, we are able to provide accurate diagnosis and treatment aimed at preventing recurrence for patients troubled by corns, calluses, and warts.

X-ray image of a patient with inter-toe corns and calluses.

When treatment at other clinics only addresses the skin surface without identifying the cause, recurrence is inevitable.

Inter-toe corn between the fourth and fifth toes that worsened following laser and injection treatment at another clinic.

Because this corn and callus originates not from a corn root but from a bony spur (osteophyte) on the toe bone, it continuously irritates the skin between the toes.

The toe bone spur must be removed for accurate and definitive corn treatment to be possible.

Corn and callus removal surgery on the toes and between the toes is performed under local anesthesia rather than general anesthesia, which shortens the operating time and reduces the cost of the procedure.

After removing the corn from the skin surface, excising the bony spur visible on the X-ray resolves the toe corn that was causing the pain.

Suturing after corn removal surgery.

When suturing is completed cleanly after inter-toe corn and callus removal surgery, postoperative wound complications and scarring are also minimized.

Post-operative X-ray after inter-toe corn and callus removal surgery.

This image shows the bony spur — the primary source of inter-toe corn pain — after it has been removed. The elimination of the underlying cause can be confirmed on the post-operative X-ray.

At Gangnam Standard Orthopedics, precise suturing following toe and inter-toe corn surgery minimizes postoperative scarring.

Corn specialist clinic for toe and inter-toe corns — Directions to Gangnam Standard Orthopedics:

2F, Boeun Building, 180 Saimdang-ro, Seocho-gu, Seoul

※ Gangnam Standard Orthopedics is an officially registered medical institution authorized to treat international patients.