If you are diabetic and love piercing, there are several factors that have to be kept in mind. You have to not only consult your doctor adequately, but you will also have to keep your blood sugar under control, while also determining the adequate area where you would want to get the piercing done. In this article, we have tried to accumulate all the required guidelines which will help you decide whether or not you would want to go for piercing if you are a patient of diabetes. So, come and join in for the article “Can diabetics Get Piercings?”

Relationship Between Diabetes and Body Piercings

Well, before getting any type of piercing done, people do think about the same as you need to take care of the area. However, when you are diabetic, you tend to pay more attention and you naturally become all the more wary of getting different parts of your body pierced. Being diabetic, you always stand at a higher risk of having elevated levels of blood glucose. This is important to consider as with this situation, you stand a greater chance of developing infections. The second school of thought is which part to get pierced. You have various options at your disposal- the tongue, ear lobes, belly, to even your private parts. As a diabetic, it may not be safe enough to get just any of your body parts pierced.

Read Also: Can Diabetics Get Tattoos?

Let us further see how and what a diabetic patient has to do before and after getting his or her body part pierced.

Risks for Body Piercing

There are several risks involved when you want to get your body pierced. The below-mentioned risks are the common risks that affect a person when his or her body is pierced. These risks will affect a diabetes patient as well.

• The most common risks which you can get is the infection in the area where you have had the piercing done. You need to maintain cleanliness to avoid the same.
• Also, there is a risk that you may lose blood as piercings in several sensitive areas cause a lot of bleeding.
• The amount of infection you get from piercings also depends on the needle that you have been using. If the needles are not cleaned and sterilized, you will end up with adverse effects
• High blood glucose levels also pose a higher risk of getting infection as the piercings take a longer time to heal in case of above normal blood glucose levels
• You also can experience scars in the pierced areas.

Hence, in the light of the above risks, it becomes all the more important to take good after-care of your piercings.

What do You need to Take Care of Before Piercing?

If you are diabetic and are looking forward to getting the piercing done in different parts of your body, you need to take care of the following few things before you get the piercing done.

• You should be careful to keep your blood glucose levels under control. If not, the piercing will take a long time to heal and you will end up getting a lot many infections.
• You should try to remain completely stress-free. Stress can also lead to various infections.
• Finally, do not forget to take advice from your doctor before going for any time of piercing.

How to Take Care of Your Piercing?

After you have got your piercing done, you will have to take adequate care of the same. Following are some of the guidelines for the diabetic patients:

• Check your blood glucose levels regularly. You should do it at least couple of times in a day.
• You should also be careful enough to take your insulin injections regularly and on time
• Keep the area and the piercing clean by washing the same regularly. You can use sea salt or an antibacterial soap for this purpose.
• If after the piercing, you believe that your blood glucose is above the normal levels regularly, you need to increase the dose of insulin that you regularly take
• Also, go for the regular check of the ketones. This is very important to you have type 1 diabetes
• Following guidelines will help you take care of the piercings in the mouth and tongue area:
• You should regularly take your dose of insulin if you are not able to eat appropriately
• After taking in any drink whether it is a juice, etc. you should always wash your mouth with water
• If you continue to feel unwell for a prolonged period of time, you will have to immediately consult your doctor. The following are some of the signs that will help you recognize that you are not well:
• You have redness in the pierced area for a long period of time
• There is swelling in that area for too long
• You experience a lot of pain and discomfort
• There is a burning effect that you feel
• You will also experience a kind of yellow or green colored discharge around the area

Hence, it is imperative that you take care of yourself and the pierced part both before and after getting the piercing done.

Body Parts in Which You Should Avoid Piercing if You are Diabetic

If you are diabetic, there are certain areas where, as per the experts, you should not get any type of piercing done. These particularly are those areas where the blood circulation is really poor. The following are the areas with poor blood circulation:

• Ankles
• Buttocks
• Shins
• Any other area of the body which you preferably use for administering insulin injections or other external sources of insulin.

Apart from the above-mentioned areas. Body piercings can be done in any other body parts under the supervision of your medical team.

We hope that the above post has been helpful in improving your understanding of the relationship between diabetes and piercing of various body parts. As it turns out from the above article, there is no harm in getting your body pierced even if you are diabetic, provided you take adequate care before and after getting the body pierced and also do so under the supervision of a medical expert!!