Earrings: Must-Have Fashion Accessory or Health Hazard?

Ear Piercing Treatment

Earlobe tears are a common problem facing cosmetic surgeons. For ages ear piercing has been used for individual expression. While the lobe may be the canvas for your expression, piercing puts it at risk to be torn. Whether torn by accident, a sudden pull on an earring by a child, the result of wearing heavy earrings, chronic friction from the telephone, or simply due to poor piercing technique, a tear means scaring and, depending on the deformity, surgical reconstruction.

A recent study in the journal Dermatologic Surgery evaluated the treatment techniques available to fix partially torn earlobes. Partial tears occur when the piercing canal is elongated or deformed/stretched due to trauma, but has not severed through the earlobe. The difficulty with partially torn lobes is to repair them without causing elongation of the lobule.

Experts in the study concluded that the best cosmetic treatment is the "purse-string method" which has several advantages over other techniques. The "purse-string" repair has the ability to restore the rounded look of the lobe, avoids linear scars, and the surgical procedure is easy to conduct.

"This procedure is performed under local anesthetic and takes about 10 minutes to complete," says lead author Suzan Obagi, M.D. assistant professor in dermatology at the University of Pittsburgh and director of the Cosmetic Surgery and Skin Health Center. "The piercing canal is removed with either trephine or surgical blade. A 5-0 Prolene suture is used to close the defect in a "purse-string" fashion with the knot placed at the superior aspect of the incision. The sutures are kept in place for 1 week."

After just 6 weeks you can once again don a pair of earrings, but follow these tips for preventing future tears: Don't wearing heavy, dangly earrings, avoid wearing earrings to sleep, and have your ears re-pierced using a proper technique.

The ASDS has also prepared a list of tips to consider when obtaining a piercing. To review the list, go to www.asds.net Remember: today's trend may be tomorrow's regret.

This study is published in the journal Dermatologic Surgery.

Suzan Obagi, M.D. is assistant professor in dermatology at the University of Pittsburgh and director of the Cosmetic Surgery and Skin Health Center.