If You Use Cotton Swabs To Clean Your Ears, Stop!

According to the Telegraph, every year around 7,000 people in England alone go to hospital with an injury from a cotton swab. That’s more people than are injured by razor blades!

Healthcare professionals have been trying to discourage people from cleaning their ears with cotton swabs for years as it can damage the ear drum and push wax deeper into the ear. But fittingly, nobody’s listening.

Using cotton swabs to clean your ears can cause ear infections as well as long term hearing damage. Simply put, you should never insert anything into your ear.

Produced by glands in your ear, cerumen (earwax) has antibacterials proprietress and acts as part of your body’s defence system, lubricating and cleaning the ear canal. There are a number of ways to clean your ears without depleting said cerumen (or damaging your ears) and you’re far better off using one of these.

Salt water
While most people conceive of getting salt water in your ear as fairly horrible, this is not at all unpleasant. By gently dapping in a few drops of salt water, you can effectively clean the recesses of your ear. Use water that’s warmed to 37.5 °C.

Oils
Baby oil, mineral oil and ear-cleansing oil are all safe to use on your ear passages. Ensure you check to see if you are allergic to any of the ingredients. If you’re not sure, dab some on your wrist and wait an hour to see if it flares up

Detergents
Using a detergent ear-cleaning product can also be highly effective. Hydrogen peroxide and carbamide peroxide are both good at cleaning out the ear canals and if that still doesn’t work there are further things you can do.

Irrigation or syringing
You can either have a doctor perform an irrigation or you could buy a home irrigation kit. The most popular way of doing this is to use a saline solution.

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