:: Surface Piercings ::

Surface piercings are fairly extreme piercings. They require quite a bit of patience and care to heal. Most will take a year or longer to heal. For this reason we often recommend that you have experience with other easier-to-heal piercings before getting a surface piercing.

There have been many methods over the years for trying to coax surface piercings to heal. The main obstacle has been that when flat surface skin is pierced, the body's natural reaction is to gradually reject the jewelry. The body adds new skin cells from the inside-out. As new layers of skin are added beneath the jewelry, the old layers are pushed toward the surface where they are eventually sloughed off. The jewelry is often pushed out with the layers of skin it transverses.

When normal piercing jewelry (e.g. captive bead rings, straight or curved barbells) is inserted into a surface piercing, the jewelry may begin to put pressure on the tissue between the jewelry and the surface of the skin, typically causing a "speed bump"-like rise. This pressure can cause problems during healing as it restricts blood flow to the tissue, and further encourages growing out. The less healthy the tissue, the more likely rejection is to occur.

To avoid this outcome, our preferred method is the use of special barbells ("surface barbells") which are shaped like a staple. With a surface bar, there is minimal pressure on the piercing, allowing blood to flow to the tissue between the jewelry and the surface, facilitating easier healing and increasing the probability of the piercing remaining.