# cheek peircing infection



## SarahNwendyo (Jun 3, 2009)

So i ve had my cheeks done since oct and the past month the one always gets oozy and red
and then goes away and comes back and so on. Any advice?
signed rosie cheeks


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## finn (Jun 3, 2009)

Put honey on it.


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## kai (Jun 3, 2009)

maybe it's an allergy to the metal also. is it hot to the touch...what color is the ooze?? if it's hot/warm to touch, really painful and pussing green lymph there's a good chance you have an infection, if it's just red, oozing, irritated feeling and almost scaly and your skin looks like it's trying to pull away from the jewellery it's probably an allergy. I'm only bringing this up because it would mean a different treatment then an infection. If it is an allergy you'd need to change the jewellery to a titanium or niobium stud most likely.

A whole other variable is how long are the studs in the jewellery?? If they are too long the piercings could just be aggravated because you haven't downsized your jewellery from the initial length designed to accomodate swelling. Maybe it is acting up because of an outside irritation (alcohol, compromised immune system). 

If the redness and oozing comes and goes it's probably not an infection, it could be that you were too rough with it and tore the piercing and now the piercing needs to re-heal. 

If your other piercing is fine it's probably not an allergy and a good thing to do would make a saline solution out of a quarter teaspoon of sea salt to 8 oz of water (hot as you can handle) and soak the piercing in that. 

All things considered though I'm neither a piercer or a doctor nor have I seen your piercing so I can only speculate from my own experiences healing lots of piercings on my self. 

For years I wore metal jewellery then one day it just started acting up, ears turned red and began oozing and got dry and scaly and felt irritated and sore, since then every piercing i've tried to heal with metal has given me nothing but problems so i said fuck it.


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## Mogwai (Jun 3, 2009)

I second the sea salt and water advice, and I'd add that you should try doing that for 5-10 minutes twice a day for a few days and see if that helps. Sea salt and water is what my piercer recommends to me for standard aftercare/mild infections, and it's worked well for me. 

I'm not a doctor or piercer either.


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## drun_ken (Jun 3, 2009)

don't drink any beer till they are healed...the yeast can leed to an infection...so onl;y liquar....the sea slat solution is a great idea....but you can't reely soak a cheek so just get it hot as hell and hold it in yer mouth as long as posible the spit...also don't forget to rinse with mouthwash....


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## kai (Jun 4, 2009)

you can soak your cheek by putting the solution in a shot glass after it's made and holding that over the piercing really tight.


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## pillowtron (Jun 5, 2009)

Yeah, heat up some sea salt in water and put it on there every day, try to keep them as clean as you can as well. that should clear it up pretty quick.

You can lift some sea salt from dollar generals/dollar stores pretty easily I think.


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## wildboy860 (Jun 5, 2009)

sea salt for the outside of the piercing and mouthwash for the inside.


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## pillowtron (Jun 5, 2009)

yeah, try to use non-alcohol based mouthwash too, like crest-pro health or bioteen


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## Angela (Jun 6, 2009)

finn said:


> Put honey on it.



Finn usually knows what he's talking about for this kinda stuff but I have to wonder about this advice. Honey, especially raw honey can carry bacteria that I would definitely not want to put on an infected wound. Can you you explain your thinking behind this Finn?


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## finn (Jun 7, 2009)

Angela said:


> Finn usually knows what he's talking about for this kinda stuff but I have to wonder about this advice. Honey, especially raw honey can carry bacteria that I would definitely not want to put on an infected wound. Can you you explain your thinking behind this Finn?



Honey will carry fungi spores, which is why you don't feed it to babies, but to my knowledge, doesn't carry bacteria, which is why it's used in burns. There is the possibility of it carrying in bacterial endospores, but its antibacterial action should prevent it from maturing. The only thing to worry about, I'd think is it causing a oxygen-free environment, but I don't think the honey would stay in place to do that long enough in the mouth. I just typed in the honey suggestion quickly, but now I'd say that the cheeks just don't want to be pierced.

The places around and in the mouth tend to be the places where people heal the quickest because of all the bacteria that we carry in there, and it doesn't seem that the cheeks are getting used to the piercing, which is why it inflames, gets better, and then inflames again. Either way, it might be good to hear some more input from SarahNwendyo.


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