Times have changed, my friends. Long gone are the days when young girls were actually nervous about piercing their ears. Nowadays, ears are not the only body part being pierced. Lips, eyebrows, chins and tongues are all fair game.

Body piercing has become so commonplace in American culture that people from all walks of life are piercing, including athletes. However, athletes should take certain factors into consideration before they run to the local tattoo parlor. Health risks, healing time for a new piercing and potential injuries are important aspects to consider.

Almost all athletes sweat for long periods of time because of the intense amount of exercise, making it difficult to keep a piercing clean, which is essential for avoiding infections. Keeping a piercing clean becomes even more complicated when the piercing is under clothes (for example, a navel ring).

Athletes run the risk of having the piercing forcibly ripped out because of heightened physical contact while participating in athletics.

Sometimes the body has an adverse reaction to a piercing, causing complications such as excessive swelling, or possibly an allergic reaction. Infection also is common for piercings and can lead to other health problems.

Although these risks are certainly not unique to athletes, they can have serious repercussions to an athlete's season if they do occur.

Timing and placement of a new body piercing is key. Like a tattoo, the level of pain varies depending on where you get pierced. A football player would not want to pierce his ear cartilage in the middle of the season, because the pressure of his helmet would cause pain. Placement also affects healing time. For example, the ear lobe takes six to eight weeks to heal as opposed to four months to a year for the ear cartilage.

Another thing to consider is that most piercings are difficult to remove from somebody else's body. In fact, athletic trainers are now told to let the athletes remove the ring themselves. If an athlete is seriously injured during competition, a piercing could interfere with treatment. For example, a nose or tongue ring could possibly interfere with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, and in other cases, a ring could interfere with the results of a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) exam.

Also, body piercing may conflict with various playing rules in certain sports. Some sports have restrictions on jewelry, which may include piercings. Student-athletes should check the playing rules for their sports before participating in contests with piercings.

I am not saying that athletes should avoid body piercing, but I am saying they should consider all the possible ramifications, especially during their primary playing season.