Careful…Tongue piercing can take your Life!

(Photo: Piercinghelp.com)
Yes, it’s true tongue piercing can at times be so dangerous to lead to you to your death-bed as it happened to Kate Donovan, 20, who died at a Boston hospital on Monday. She died of viral meningitis after getting an infection from a tongue piercing. (Source)

She developed an infection in the pierced tongue and even antibiotics did’nt seem to help, thus leading to severe headaches. She was hospitalized but unfortunately lost her life.

Tongue piercing is a very common trend and apart from being a fashion statement it provides more pleasurable oral sex. The piercing increase sexual stimulation, during fondling females tend to get the most benefits with a tongue ring as the ball of the ring can directly stimulate the clitoris and in males the ball acts as a massage for the movable skin on the shaft of their genital.

There are many types of the tongue piercings like surface tongue piercing, tongue web piercing done through the webbing under the tongue and tongue rim piercing which is on the outer edge of the tongue.

(Photo)
In some cases it is not that risky and gets healed in about a month with proper aftercare by rinsing the tongue regularly with salt water or mouthwash.

Bacterial infections and meningitis can be a complication from tongue piercing however, meningitis is not contagious. Meningitis is an infection of the tissue that surrounds the brain and spinal cord. It’s prominent symptoms may appear suddenly and include fever, severe and constant headache, stiff neck or neck pain, nausea and vomiting and rash. It is believed that the bacteria commonly found in the mouth and saliva possibly enter the bloodstream through the hole punched into the tongue thus leading to the firestorm of infection.

In addition to risk of infection, Hepatitis C and tetanus, the Journal of the American Association finds that tongue piercing can lead to trigeminal neuralgia, also known as the “suicide disease,” which results in facial pain resembling electrical shocks.

Here, I’m not scaring you from getting your tongue pierced but a serious recommendation – visit a professional and experienced person for it!