Body Piercing Aftercare

Cleaning your new piercing

Before you do anything… WASH YOUR HANDS!!! You should never handle a fresh piercing with dirty hands.

Soak your piercing with some warm water to loosen any dry lymph around the jewelry, do not pick at any ‘crusties’.

Wash your piercing twice a day (morning and night) with an unscented, non-antibacterial soap. We recommend Dr. Bronners Baby Mild Castile soap.

Apply a small amount of soap to the end of a qtip and clean the exposed part of the jewellery on each end, then rinse well with clean water to ensure there is no soap left in or around the piercing.

If you think you got your piercing dirty throughout the day (you work out or went swimming… etc) it is more than ok to clean a piercing a third time a day, just make sure you give it a good rinse afterwards.

Sea Salt Soaks

Non-Iodized Sea Salts help promote healing while reducing irritation. Other salts (table salt, Epsom salt) can contain extra chemicals which may irritate your new piercing. We recommend Dead Sea Salts which contain extra minerals to aid your healing.

Add a 1/4 teaspoon of Sea Salt to a cup of hot water, allow it to cool so you don’t burn yourself and soak the piercing for 20-30 minutes. Use a hot compress (cotton ball or gauze pad) if you cannot fully submerge the piercing.

Sea Salt Soaks are excellent for a new and healing piercing but it is important you don’t overuse them. Only soak your piercing 2-3 times a week, unless recommended otherwise by your piercer. Overusing the soaks can dry out your skin and the piercing.

Sea salt rinses for an oral piercing: Add 1/4 teaspoon Sea Salt to 1 cup hot water, let it cool and use as an oral rinse for as long as you can stand (2 – 5 min)

Chamomile Tea

Chamomile tea is a natural anti-inflammatory, so it helps to reduce redness and swelling in a fresh piercing.

Use the tea bag as a hot compress dipping it into hot water (or the hot sea salt water) and then hold it against the piercing for anywhere up to 20 minutes.

Repeat as often as needed.

For Oral Piercings:

Brew the pot of Chamomile Tea and make small ice cubes out of it. Gently suck on thesethroughout the day to reduce swelling in the mouth. Repeat as often as needed.

Oral Piercings

If your piercing is half inside and half outside your mouth (i.e. lip, Monroe, cheek… etc) then continue using soap and water to clean the outside of the piercing.

Rinse your mouth for 20-30 seconds after you ingest anything that isn’t water (eating, drinking, smoking) using a nonalcoholic mouthwash like Tech 2000 advanced dental rinse. Repeat whenever necessary up to 10 times a day.

Smoking, Excessive talking, spicy foods and oral contact (kissing, oral sex) should be avoided during the healing period.

To prevent or reduce swelling you can suck on an ice cube or sip a glass of ice water.

Genital Piercings

Follow the instructions under ‘cleaning your new piercing’

Avoid sexual contact for the first couple weeks and make sure any sexual contact during the healing period is SAFE. Always use protection (condom, dental dam) with a fresh piercing as you and your partner are at high risk.

The Don’ts

Things to avoid:

Rubbing alcohol and Hydrogen peroxide are way too strong to be using on a fresh piercing, they will kill the new skin cells your body needs to form in order to create scar tissue and will slow down healing.

Polysporin and Neosporin are petroleum based products which your body cannot break down. They create a waterproof seal over the piercing which traps bacteria inside the piercing.

Perfumed, dyed, or cream soaps can be quite irritating to a new piercing and can cause reactions.

Band-aids create warm, wet, dark places perfect for bacteria to thrive in. You may as well put up a big vacancy sign welcoming bacteria in!

Make-up and Hair products

Alcoholic mouthwashes like Listerine or Scope. Just like rubbing alcohol will irritate a fresh piercing, alcoholic mouthwashes will prolong the healing time on your new oral piercing.

Non-Alcohol Based Mouthwashes contain chemicals (i.e. thymol) that affect healthy bacteria and burn (dermo-caustic) after repeated use.

Well meaning people who contradict the information given by NEXT! Piercing staff and this aftercare brochure.

Hot tubs and pools. For the first few weeks you’ll want to stay out of chlorinated water as it will irritate your piercing. If it can’t be avoided make sure to clean the piercing thoroughly afterwards.

Downsizing

NEXT! Downsizing policy:

  1. You MUST HAVE YOUR RECIEPT!!!

  2. There is a $15 sterilization fee to downsize (if you don’t have your receipt you will pay full price for new jewellery)

  3. We will not downsize earlier than the recommended waiting time. There are NO EXCEPTIONS to this rule, so please don’t ask.

    4. Downsize times:

    Navel: 4-6 months

    Lip/Labret/Monroe: 2-3 months

    Ear Cartilage: 4-6 months

    Tongue: 4-6 weeks 

    Nipple: 3-4 months 

    Nostril: 2 months 

    Eyebrow: 2-3 months

    Other: please ask

    These times are minimum times only. We will not downsize a piercing that is not ready. There are times when the wait will be longer than these estimated times depending on how the piercing is healing. These times do not represent the time it takes for your piercing to heal; they are merely the minimum time you must wait to downsize (shorten) your barbell.