Piercing Aftercare: Helping Your New Piercing Heal

How to Care for Your Healing Piercing

Congratulations on your new piercing! You can feel good that it was performed by a professional in a clean, safe environment using the best body jewelry available. Follow these simple suggestions to ensure a smooth healing process:

• Maintain a healthy mind and body. Understanding how your body works will help you take the steps necessary to promote successful healing. Drink plenty of water, eat healthy, and keep a positive attitude.
• Get some rest and take it easy. Get plenty of sleep and try to maintain a low-stress lifestyle.
• Keep your piercing clean. Keep your bedding, eyewear, and anything else that may contact your new piercing clean. Clean your piercing consistently.
• Consider taking a multivitamin. Multivitamins containing Zinc and Vitamin C can boost your body’s healing abilities. Sickness, stress, and fatigue will negatively affect the healing of your piercing.
• Get help if something goes wrong. If you feel your piercing is infected, contact us or a physician immediately!

What to Expect

Your new piercing may:

• Bleed a bit or be swollen for the first few days. A cold compress and/or ice will help reduce swelling and slow bleeding.
• Be tender, itchy, or even bruised for a few weeks.
• Secrete a whiteish-yellow fluid which may dry on the piercing. This is normal and will stop when the piercing is healed. Do not pick this with your fingers!

What to Avoid

While your piercing is healing, please avoid the following:

• Touching your piercing, except when you are cleaning it
• Twisting, turning, or removing your jewelry. Removal can result in the piercing closing.
• Oral contact or contact with another person’s bodily fluids
• Using any aftercare products that we did not suggest
• Exposing your piercings to alcohol, peroxide, lotions, sprays, or makeup
• Swimming in lakes, rivers, public pools, hot tubs, etc. If you cannot avoid it, use Tegaderm (a waterproof, breathable bandage) to protect your piercing.

Special Oral Piercing Aftercare Needs

Cleaning

• Inside: rinse 2 to 3 times daily with the antimicrobial mouthwash or dental rinse. Swish gently for 30 to 60 seconds. Rinse with salt water after meals.
• Outside: Rinse twice daily with saline spray and/or rinse daily in the shower.

Downsizing

For oral piercings, longer posts are necessary initially, and shorter posts are needed once swelling has gone down. This is important, as longer posts can cause gum or enamel damage if worn too long! We will take a look at your 4-week checkup.

Downloadable Aftercare Resources

What is the APP?

The Association of Professional Piercers (APP) is an international health and safety nonprofit organization. The APP has dedicated itself to the dissemination of misinformation about body piercing. Governed by a voluntary, elected Board of Directors, the APP is a united group of piercing professionals that freely shares information to help fellow members, piercers, health care professionals, legislators, health inspectors, and the general public get the best and most up-to-date information about body piercing.

What does it mean to me, the client?

To be a member of the APP, a studio and the piercers themselves must meet and/or exceed strict APP Member Requirements, such as stocking a specific quality of jewelry, staying up-to-date on CPR, first aid, and blood-borne pathogens training, running spore tests on all sterilization equipment, and more!

If you see a studio employing APP members, you know you’re in the hands of staff members who care. Every Black Hole Body Piercing employee is either an APP Associate or Business Member, adhering to the guidelines and staying up-to-date on their education.