Industrial Piercing Infection

Industrial Piercing Infection???

This is one of the many reasons why doctors strongly recommend against piercings of this kind. The hole can get seriously infected on the inside and there is no way to effectively clean it.

Watch for painful swelling in the weeks to come and the possiblity of puss filled blisters occuring on the inside of the hole and working their way to the surface.

Go sit in a whirlpool or hot tub and soak the affected area. The water may get in and wash the infection away and the heat will help drive the infection outwards. Though the infection may pollute the water in the process. Applying warm wet cloth as a compress the rest of the time could help too. You might want to take some antibiotics as well and treat the problem from the inside out. See your doctor if it gets bad enough.

Is my industrial piercing infected?

So I got my industrial done exactly 4 weeks ago and it's been healing fine. But I was moving it to clean it this morning and I noticed there wasn't as much of the bar exposed on the outside of my ear as usual when I moved it. What happened was the skin on the upper part of my ear where the piercing exits it has swollen or something. It's not huge or anything, just bigger than before. It's kind of white, but my skin could just be dry or irritated. On Saturday my skin healed to it because I wasn't able to rotate it at all during the day, and I was out in the cold for hours. So when I finally was able to turn it it had ripped at the skin a little, I don't think it bled though.
I'm sorry I'm really bad at explaining .-.
I don't know what an infected piercing looks like either, I've never seen one. It's not oozing pus or anything, but it still does get a little crusty, and I'm always cleaning stuff of the bar where there isn't any skin touching it.

Also, can you take it out after 4 weeks? I can't remember what my piercer said.

Infected Industrial Piercing?

This bump is an infected cyst/boil.

If the bump does not ooze pus or bleeds, hurts etc you know it's not a keloid. Keloids are formations or scar tissue ( new skin ) and they don't hurt or ooze at all. That is how you know that your bump is not a keloid.

How to treat an infected cyst : Sea salt soaks. Warm water + non iodized salt mixed in a cup. Soak the piercing in for 5-10 minutes , 2-3 times a day. Use a q-tip to clean around the piercing thoroughly, rinse with water and pat it dry with a paper towel.
This will treat the infection avoid new ones and help the piercing to heal.

If you see no difference in 3 days ( the bump to slowly start shrinking ) then use Tea Tree Oil with a q-tip 2 times a day.

If again you see no difference in 3 day you will need to see a dermatologist. He will prescribe a proper antibacterial cream ( with cortisone ) to treat it.

You had to follow your piercers aftercare instructions but you didn't. you had to keep cleaning the piercing 2 times a day with sea salt soaks in order to avoid all those issues.

Most piercings need 6 months to fully heal, but industrial takes 1 full year to do so because it goes through cartilage. Cartilage piercings are not easy to heal so you need to be extra careful with those if you want to keep yourself and the piercing healthy,

DO NOT TAKE IT OUT UNLESS THE INFECTIONS IS GONE. Sorry for the caps, but this is really important for your general health. If you take out an infected piercing, the infection gets trapped inside as the piercing is closing up and from there can move further into the body. In order to treat the infection and make it go away, the jewelry has to stay in and the piercing has to be open. If you take it out the infection will go deeper and then you will need to be hospitalized and even have surgery to take care of it.

You need to : Keep doing sea salt soaks 2 times a day, never touch the piercing or twist it, or sleep on it, or change the jewelry, but only touch it with freshly washed hands to clean it for the whole period of 1 year.

Gluck and next time take proper care of a piercing, because it's a serious matter.

Infected Industrial piercing? What do I do?

It dos'nt sound infected cartilidge piercings take around a year to heal and it's very common for them to be fine then go downhill again. There are alot of ups and down with cartilidge piercings.

It's probably not puss coming out of the hole but rather something called Lymph which is just something produced by the body to help try and heal the piercing. White, clear or yellowish white discharge is normal, green means infection.

I've had my helix pierced for alittle over a year and I hit it a couple weeks ago pretty hard on accident and it got swollen and hot and started oozing but after frequent cleanings it finally settled down again.

Clean the piercing with Saline solution and do Sea Salt soaks ( 1/4 sea salt to 8 oz warm water ) soak ear in a cup of it every other day for 10 minutes then rinse with fresh water. This will really help speed up healing or calm it down.

If your worried go to your piercer, don't go to a doctor right away they generally don't know much about piercings and will just tell you to take it out. Btw you should never take out a infected piercing because you can trap the infection, you need the hole open to get rid of the infection. Also don't listen to ppl who say use alcohol or peroxide it's to harsh and prolongs healing.

Cartilidge piercings get pissed really easily ha ha ... Just keep cleaning it twice a day ... Do a sea salt soak every other day ... And most importantly besides cleaning it leave it alone don't touch it just leave it be. No matter how tempting.

Good Luck !

Should I give up on my infected industrial piercing?

I have multiple piercings in my ears, as well as my navel and my eyebrow. I still have one of the three piercings in my right cartilage but I had to remove the other two because they REFUSED to heal up!!!! Sounds to me like you're going to have the same problem! Sometimes our bodies just reject foreign objects. It happens to people a lot!

One thing I would suggest trying differently: you really should NOT be using antibacterial handsoap on an unhealed piercing. Any good piercer would have told you that. You should swing by a piercing parlor and get some antimicrobial soap like Satin. Hand soaps are usually too harsh and will dry out the tissue that is trying to heal- which slows it down!!! Also, (for the same reason!!), don't use rubbing alcohol or peroxide. Just find a better soap and keep doing sea salt soaks once or twice a day (but make sure you're doing it long enough to make it count...if once a day, about 10-15 minutes!). Oh- and try using pillows to keep yourself from rolling onto the side of your piercing during your sleep, because that really is going to irritate even a piercing that is healing in a healthy way!

And no matter what happens- follow your intuition! If it's very painful all the time, starts bleeding or leaking pus, or just downright feels wrong...PLEASE see a doctor. Ears are a dangerous place to get an infection!!! They can offer antibiotics. ------- If you take out the piercing and it has infection, without antibiotics and proper cleaning it will heal the outside and trap in the infection!!!!!!!!!!!! ---
[[sorry this is so long! good luck!]]

What are the signs of an infected industrial piercing?

Purple blood-like bumps means it is getting irritated. They go away if you clean it ALL of the time. However your cartilage may just reject the piercing and those bumps might appear all the time and fade away...I had my industrial however I took it out because it hurt and it didn't seem to be healing. However, I didn't clean it all the time. If you stay with a scheduled cleaning with sea salt and warm water, the bumps and infections should go away.

Is my industrial piercing infected? Should I take it out? ?

The little bumps forming could be keloids trust me you do not want them they become these tiny hard bumps that are their for life unless you get surgery or injections. The cleaning part your doing is right sea salt works great and twisting is good. You might want to buy some different kind because you got it from a sketchy shop. H20 is a brand that is really good and also at walmart in the salt aisle they have sea salt it comes in a yellow looking tube. Also when i got my piercing i was told i could use listerine mouth wash the original kind the brownish color one. Also dial antibacterial soap take a q-tip add water rub on bar of soap and clean piercing. Try a couple of these things if it dosent change in a couple of days take out the piercing but continue to clean the holes because you dont want it to close with an infection inside. Also if you use hair products in your hair this could be causing your problem gel hairspray being sprayed on it could cause probles. Also you should be cleaning your piercing three times a day once in morning once in the middle and once before you go to bed. (The bar could be irrating your ear since it was a sketchy place you got pierced at you might want to make sure the bar is sterling silver. next time dont go 2 a sketchy place check out the place and talk to people who have went to the places. Getting piercings and tatoos is like buying merchandise shopping around finding the best qualites just because it looks ok doesnt mean its ok.?) Good luck i hope your piecring heals ok. Allmost forgot clean your pillowcases and sheets and try not to sleep on the ear with the piercing .

Tips for healing an infected industrial piercing?

I have my industrial and it got these bubble-like bumps around the holes before a couple months after I got it done. What I was told by the piercing shop was do NOT take it out and allow it to close up. If you don't get rid of the infection and the piercing closes up, the infection can then spread. I know that sounds scary, but it's true. They said if I wanted to take it out I would have to cure the infection before I did so. Now as for the care, this is what I did and it worked really well. Use a distilled water and mix in some sea salt. Make sure to stir it up good so that most all of the salt dissolves into the water. I then took a q-tip and clean the holes where the bumps were with this solution. I guess you could also hold the cup on your ear and let it soak too, that just seems like it would be uncomfortable. Do this twice a day, once in the morning and once at night before bed. Once you do that, dry it with the tip of a q-tip and then use a q-tip to apply bacitracin (a basic ointment, similar to neosporin) on the infected areas. You can then move the barbell a little bit back and forth if you want to get some of the medcine into the holes. Keep so this until you see some results. If it gets any worse though, or doesn't improve at all in two weeks or so, go to the doctors so they can give you an antibiotic to help cure the infection. Oh, and DON'T squeeze the bumps!!