Piercing Aftercare & Advice

Aftercare Instructions
Always wash your hands thoroughly with antibacterial soap and warm water before applying any aftercare. Most piercings usually take approx. 4-6weeks to be healed adequately enough to change jewellery. However, this can be lessened with oral piercings. If the piercing appears red and inflamed, this does not necessarily mean that it is infected. If you have any doubts about any piercing performed at Modified, please return to the studio and bring your concerns to our attention.

General Advice:
• Keep any dressing on for 1-2 hours after leaving the studio.
• Do not touch or turn the jewellery in the piercing.
• Do not change the jewellery for at least 4-6 weeks, except tongue piercings which can usually be changed to a shorter bar after 2 weeks.
• Keep the area around the piercing as dry as possible. Gently dry with a towel after a bath/shower.
• Apply sea salt solution/Savlon/H20cean twice daily. Use water that has been boiled and allowed to cool, add a teaspoon of sea salt per pint of water.
• Never use table salt.
• Do not use strong antiseptics and creams such as surgical spirit or TCP.
• Let air circulate around the piercing whenever possible.
• Wear clean, loose clothes around the piercing.
• Do not attempt to increase the size of the jewellery until the piercing has fully healed.
• Some swelling/redness/itchiness is to be expected. It is perfectly normal.
• If the piercing swells so much that the jewellery is too short, please come back to the studio.
• Do not remove any jewellery from the piercing if it becomes infected. If you feel it has become infected, please contact us. If we are unavailable, contact your GP.

Specific Advice:
Tongue Piercings – The tongue will be quite swollen for the first 1-2 weeks. This is completely normal. Until the swelling subsides, try to stick to soft foods. Do not eat spicy foods or dairy. Rinse your mouth daily with antibacterial mouthwash. If you have had any lip piercings, you can also rinse with antibacterial mouthwash.

Cheek/Dahlia Piercings – There can also be a substantial amount of swelling with cheek piercings. This is completely normal. If the jewellery becomes too short, return to the studio for a free replacement. Cheek piercings can often take a while to heal. Usually longer than the average 4-6weeks found with other piercings.

Cartilage Piercings - There can sometimes be the formation of hypertrophic scarring or keloids around cartilage piercings. Hypertrophic scarring is heavy scarring that appears around a piercing. Hypertrophic scars go away both with treatment and with time. In a lot of cases, the jewellery is inappropriate (it's too heavy, or has a poor shape), and creates stress around the fistula. Simply change the jewellery and the scar might go away in few days. Keloids are a specific kind of fibrous scar tissue. Keloid scars always extend well past the edges of the original wound/scar and tend to be darker in colour than hypertrophic scars.

Surface Piercings - Surface piercings can be prone to migrate (grow out), and if this happens you should take out the jewellery to avoid scarring. You can cut the PTFE bar down shorter, but prolonged migration may cause worse scarring.

Micro Dermal Implants/Skin Divers – Micro Dermals and Skin Divers can be notably temperamental. We would advise against cleaning these with Sea Salt Solution/Savlon/H20cean etc, as it softens the skin around the implant, making it easier to unsettle the base. Daily showers, being gentle with the area of the implant, should be adequate enough.

IF YOU HAVE ANY CONCERNS REGARDING A PIERCING YOU HAVE RECEIVED AT MODIFIED PIERCING STUDIO, PLEASE DO NOT HESITATE TO CONTACT US :)