14 year old piercing problem

[amyt250190]

My DD who is 14 got her cartilage pierced when she was in tenerife about a month ago with me, the place was very clean, the piercer wore disposable gloves and washed her hands and everything was sterile and it has been fine until last week when she was at her grandparent's home it got very red, painful and swollen and infectef so she bathed it in warm water and sea salt 2/3 times a day and now she is back it keeps bleeding and getting like a bit of crusty blood around it. Should I ring the GP?

You'd be better off taking her into a local piercing place and asking them to have a look. They'll be able to tell you whether you need to see a gp.

I wouldn't be too worried, she's only had it a month so it'll still be sore and it'll have only just started healing. Plus if she got it done on holiday and then went in the swimming pool or sea it may be bleeding to get all the chlorine/sea bacteria out. Definitely see a local piercer but he'll probably just keep telling you to do a salt soak and keep an eye on it. Make sure the jewellery is sized properly too. When you do a salt soak, dry the piercing after with a hair dryer as the water can make it worse too.

Definitely take her to a local piercing place.

My bet is that they haven't used titanium jewellery. Most reputable places in the uk will only use titanium now as it has the lowest risk of reaction (that's why they use titanium for surgery in joints etc).

A good piercing place will be able to advise you and may be able to replace the jewellery. My dd got her cartilage done a while back at the same tattoo and piercing studio my dh gets tattooed at (he is heavily involved in the industry) and she hasn't had any crusting or pus at all apart from a very tiny amount a few days afterwards.

If the ear becomes hot to the touch or she feels unwell she will need to see the gp.

When my daughter had hers done in the uk , they told us that they can take up to 6 months to heal properly as it takes more time in the cartrilige than a normal piercing .Keep bathing in salt water my daughter had to do this for quiet a few months.

Did she happen to knock or disrupt it? Sounds like it's ok from my experience but I'm no professional. There shouldn't be any pus/coloured fluid coming out but if it's just weeping or bleeding, I would just keep up the warm salt water unless it gets worse. Maybe putting some savlon or something similar on it would help?

That's very normal. Cartilage can take up to 12 months to heal.

We are doing the saltwater soaks and the piercing place said it was irritated because it was being cleaned too much so we have gone to cleaning it twice a day but now there is a bump at the bit of her cartilage where the ball of the piercing is and at the back on the back of the flat bit there is a lot of dried blood which is very hard to get off, we have phoned the gp and they have said it will take between 3 and 6 werks for an appointment! Absolutely disgusting!

I had a new cartilage piercing about a month ago and it is still crusting an bleeding from time to time. Is she absolutely leaving it along between cleans? No twisting, fiddling or playing.

Agree with PP about the jewellery used. I have a nickel allergy so anything other than titanium would get really irritated. Have found this with cheap stuff ordered off eBay etc.

Clean I once a day. If infected savlon put on once it's cleaned helps but probably shouldn't be used until the 6 month mark

Its definately not infected, we saw a piercer this morning and they said that the weird liquid coming out with the blood is lymph fluid and other than that its fine and just to keep cleaning it. Thank you all for the replies