Body piercing is popular, especially among teens. However, body piercing and tattoos were once considered taboo but now they are more accepted. Vendetta, a 21-year-old senior in LAS, recently decided to pierce his lower lip, following a trend common among college students. (...)

Today, people get their any part pierced whether it is their ear, nose, tongue, eyebrows, lips, genitals, belly buttons or even other places. People are ready to poke holes in any part of their body. According to a dermatology study, three out of four Americans who are pierced are women, twice as many Democrats are pierced than Republicans, and about one out of three young adults sport tattoos. Besides the ear lobe, with women outnumbering men by 49-19 per cent, piercing is done on the nose, eyebrow, navel and the tongue. If you walk on a mall, you will see many piercing jewelries, which are not tacky or ugly, but are very regular pieces. So, what makes body piercing so bad, then?
Every different piercing has its own other face and I am here talking about the other side of ‘Navel Piercing.‘ Though navel is among the commonly pierced organ among teens, it is also one which takes as long as nine months to heal and often keloids (scar tissue) form. Infection is very common and most of the times students just take out the navel ring and let it heal.

On Feb, 16, Janaee Smith, a sophomore at Southside High, Greenville of South Carolina, got her navel pierced. Unfortunately, she died and her friend suspects her pierced navel to be the cause of her death, as she did it at home.

Amanda Crocker, a licensed professional for four years said following about piercing done at home:

It’s not uncommon to have a teenager come in that has had her naval pierced at home. A friend does it at a party maybe and it never turns out well... There are not just infections, but disease transmission is a big issue today. You have to be very careful’

She added that it’s never safe to get a piercing from someone unlicensed or at home as their instruments are not that sanitized. Three steps to achieve germ free instruments:

1. Instruments are sprayed and left for ten minutes

2. Set under UV light

3. Put through a steam process to kill any left over germs.

Thus, a proper sterilized instrument is available at licensed piercing parlor or shop. If you say that, you can arrange all these activities to sterilize your instrument then also I will say that you are not perfect to pierce your navel because you do not know the exact point where to pierce. In addition, if you pierce on some wrong point of your navel then you will end up with swelling or other problem.

Aftercare for your New Navel Piercing:
� Do not go out in sunlight or allow water to get into your a fresh piercing as it slows down healing or cause infection.

� Wear a one piece bathing suit if you are going to be out on a beach or cover your navel with bandage

� Keep your navel jewelry clean from dirt and debris (like lotions and sunscreen)

� Use best cleaning solution and method to clean your navel jewelry.

Hope you’ll keep in mind all above mentioned points while you go in for navel piercing.

Have a Happy Navel Piercing!