Symptoms:- You may experience severe pain, redness and swelling in and around the piercing site.
- Often, very often, a white fluid drains out of piercing. This must not be mistaken with pus, because it is lymphatic fluid that acts like a cleanser for dirt and bacteria.
- After a few days, yellowish crust forms, indicating that the piercing has started healing. However, it cannot be with every piercing.
- If proper care is not taken while piercing, it can lead to infections or if you do not take proper aftercare instructions, infections may develop.
- Infections are characterized with pus formation, bleeding, throbbing pain and bumps on piercing. Sometimes, piercing may produce foul smell.
A professional piercer must advise a person about proper piercing care. He must execute some precautionary steps while piercing. He must use sterilized instruments and wear clean gloves while piercing. Apart from these, a person who gets his ear pierced must follow the following steps to avoid cartilage infection.
- Do not touch cartilage piercing with the naked hands. Dirty hands is the access point for bacteria to enter the piercing.
- Use a disinfectant soap to wash the hands properly.
- Never play with piercing jewelry. Fingering the piercing jewelry with dirty hands cause infection.
- While putting on clothes, take proper care of piercing.
- Use an antiseptic lotion to clean the piercing twice a day, till it heals completely. You can soak jewelry in alcohol solution for disinfecting it.
- Never apply hydrogen peroxide, tea tree oil or alcohol directly on piercing.
- Don’t change the jewelry frequently in the initial months.
- Always keep your hair clean and do not keep the public telephone receiver on the ear directly.
