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Stitching methods
Before piercing, the entry and exit points are marked with a felt-tip pen. The area of the body to be pierced is first disinfected to prevent infection. If necessary, hair is removed from the area beforehand. The entry and exit points of the piercing channel are usually marked with a pen and fixed in place with piercing pliers. These have two ring-shaped clamps on the head, through which the piercing needle can be placed on the marked area and guided through. In Europe, piercings are usually performed using a peripheral venous catheter. The needle is protected by a plastic or Teflon coating. Once the needle has been inserted through the skin, it is removed. Only the coating remains in the puncture channel. The jewelry is pulled through the stitch channel with the help of this coating. In hard-to-reach and narrow areas, a receiving tube is often held in place during piercing to create counter-pressure and intercept the needle before it can damage tissue opposite the puncture channel.
In the USA, piercers usually use a special piercing needle made of surgical steel with a cavity. The jewelry is inserted directly into the needle and then inserted into the connective tissue as it is pushed through.
For ear or nostril piercings, the ear piercing gun is often used outside of piercing studios, for example by jewelers. However, reputable piercers reject this method as there is a risk of the tissue tearing or splintering at cartilage points. In addition, the gun cannot be completely sterilized. In addition, the ear studs used are unsuitable for initial use.
Another method is the so-called dermal punch. This involves punching out pieces of tissue with a hollow needle up to a diameter of eight millimeters. This is mainly used to insert larger jewelry into cartilage tissue. Because tissue is completely removed and not displaced, pierced piercings heal better as the jewelry exerts less pressure.
Indigenous peoples usually perform piercings traditionally using suitable natural materials such as thorns or pointed animal bones. On the Pacific Islands, for example, the pointed ends of the sweet potato plant are used.
Pain when pricking
Frequently expressed concerns relate to the pain associated with the puncture procedure. The pain stimulus when the cannula is inserted can be perceived with varying degrees of intensity. Different piercings differ according to the degree of pain experienced when piercing.
This is influenced on the one hand by the length of the puncture channel and on the other hand by the type and sensitivity to pain of the tissue through which the piercing runs. Piercings with a long canal are generally more painful. Accordingly, piercing a Christina piercing, for example, is less painful than piercing a Nefertiti piercing, as the piercer covers a longer distance with the needle and guides it through more slowly. In turn, cartilage tissue, such as on the nostril, and mixed tissue containing cartilage, such as in the lip area, are considered to be relatively sensitive to pain when pierced.
For this reason, piercings through the ear cartilage (such as helix, rook or tragus) are more painful than a lobe piercing through the earlobe.
The sensitivity of a body part to touch should not be confused with its sensitivity to pain. This is due to different nerve pathways and receptors for the different types of stimuli. Normal tactile stimuli on the surface of the skin (such as light pressure or stroking) are registered by mechanoreceptors, in particular the Ruffini corpuscles, the Vater-Pacini lamellar corpuscles and the Merkel cells, and are transmitted to the brain via corresponding neuronal pathways. The pain caused by the insertion of the needle, on the other hand, is caused by receptors called nociceptors, which react to the tissue injury and transmit the pain via separate neuronal pathways. The pain arising from the piercing is mainly caused by A mechanonociceptors, which are distributed relatively evenly over the body surface. This explains why piercings in the genital area, although the tissue there is very sensitive to touch, are generally not perceived as more painful than piercings in other areas of the body.
Anesthesia
In principle, it is possible to anesthetize the body area before piercing. This can be done in two ways:
Regional anesthesia: This involves injecting an anesthetic that acts subdermally (in the tissue) using a syringe. After a period of around five to ten minutes, the affected area of the body is anaesthetized. However, the following problems arise here: firstly, due to legal regulations, an injection may only be carried out by a doctor or a medical professional, not by a piercer. Furthermore, this form of anesthesia is not recommended, as the pain of the piercing is virtually only exchanged for comparable pain from the injection and this form of anesthesia is associated with side effects and risks that are not commensurate with the pain of the piercing.
Surface anesthesia (topical anesthesia): an active ingredient in the form of an ointment or spray is applied directly to the surface of the skin, rather than being injected. Products based on lidocaine, procaine or benzocaine are mainly used. The problem with this form is that it is only suitable for mucosal tissue, as otherwise the deeper layers of tissue are not reached and piercing is no less painful.
For these reasons, anesthesia is often not used before the piercing.
Healing
As the wound of a new piercing is kept open by the jewelry used, a skin tube forms from the outside inwards along the piercing channel during healing, which surrounds the jewelry. This initially promotes blood circulation in the surrounding tissue after any bleeding has clotted, which often leads to redness, swelling and warming in the first to second week. Blood clots are flushed out by secreted wound fluid. In the event of an infection, bacteria-fighting leukocytes (pus) may be released.
The duration of healing depends on various factors such as jewelry material, hygiene, care and the punctured body part as well as general health and alcohol or nicotine consumption. While mucous membranes with a good blood supply and intimate piercings with regular contact to the patient's own urine heal more quickly, the process takes longer with cartilage tissue, as cartilage does not have its own blood vessels but is supplied with oxygen and nutrients by the overlying cartilage skin.
Measures to accelerate healing
The piercing should be cleaned regularly with saline solution or an antiseptic such as octenidine during the entire healing phase; sources of additional bacterial contamination such as bathing in swimming pools or lakes should be avoided.
One problem is irritation caused by regular movement or friction, which can make the healing of a belly button piercing with permanent contact to the waistband or a hand weave between the fingers particularly problematic, for example. For intimate piercings, sexual intercourse should be avoided for the first four weeks, as this puts too much strain on the stitch channel (careful manual stimulation is possible after a few days, however) and a condom should be worn until complete healing to reduce contamination from germs and mechanical effects (the jewelry rubs back and forth).
If the jewelry is changed within the first few weeks after piercing, this can also have a negative effect on healing and increase the risk of infection.
Remove
If a piercing is removed before healing is complete, the stitch canal initially sticks together and then grows back together quickly and completely so that jewelry can no longer be inserted later. A completely healed canal, on the other hand, usually remains intact, which means that sebum deposits can continue to form in it. It often narrows after the jewelry is removed and grows together at the insertion and removal points, usually leaving small punctiform scars.
Healing time of various piercings
- Ampallang: approx. 3 to 6 months
- Eyebrow: approx. 6 to 8 weeks
- Bridge: approx. 8 to 12 weeks
- Nipple: approx. 2 to 6
- months Christina: approx. 8 weeks
- Dydoe: approx. 3 to 5 months
- Fourchette: approx. 4 to 6 weeks
- Guiche: approx. 8 to 12 weeks
- Hafada: approx. 4 to 8 weeks
- Clitoral hood: approx. 4 to 6 weeks
- Labia Majora: approx. 8 to 12 weeks
- Labia Minora: approx. 4 to 6 weeks
- Lip: approx. 4 to 8 weeks
- Labial frenulum: approx. 1 to 2 weeks
- Navel: approx. 3 to 6 months
- Nostril: approx. 6 to 9 weeks
- Ear cartilage: approx. 2 to 6 months
- Earlobes: approx. 4 to 8 weeks
- Weeks Prince Albert: approx. 4 to 6 weeks
- Pubic: approx. 8 weeks
- Septum: approx. 4 to 8 weeks
- Triangle: approx. 4 to 8 weeks
- Foreskin: approx. 4 to 8 weeks
- Tongue: approx. 2 weeks