Comments on: Uses of Q-tips

By: c/sgt

c/sgt — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 02:36:10 +0000

I saw this post, and you are absolutely right.
I use q-tips to get smudges off my brass, too

By: noname

noname — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 23:38:04 +0000

what you do is wet one end of the Q-tip, use it in your ear wet, then use the dry end to dry it. the wet part loosens the wax and its easier for the dry end to get wax

By: noname

noname — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 23:19:56 +0000

actually, they do seriously say not to clean your ears, but they don’t mean it even the people who made the rules used it for that!

By: huh?

huh? — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 23:17:58 +0000

how can CLEANING ears be bad for them?

By: Peadar

Peadar — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:40:41 +0000

I went to a first aid course where they showed us all how to apply olive oil to our ears for blockage by tapping an area of your head. It’s a fairly common practice with no bad side effects (exept Italians love your ears)

By: Picardkid

Picardkid — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 05:19:35 +0000

Well of course, cuz we all have boxes of those lying around, and if we run out, they’re easy to find in the pharmacy…

By: Tisi

Tisi — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 05:02:17 +0000

You MUST be doing it wrong. Here are some tips:
1. put it in your ear (not throat) that should stop the hacking lungs.
2. twist it gently (don’t just jab. It should be a twisting motion and not an in-and-out thing)
3. be more gentle

Really, cleaning your ears should feel good.

By: Tisi

Tisi — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 04:59:07 +0000

Thanks, german. I was gullible enough to believe it and was about to look into it when I read your comment.

By: Tisi

Tisi — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 04:57:57 +0000

“But, I got swimmer’s ear from the aggressive swabbing”
How? I thought you could only get swimmers ear from leaving water in your ears and having it dry slowly… More likely, the aggressive swabbing made it easier for you to *get* swimmers ear, not giving it to you directly.

By: Tisi

Tisi — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 04:55:42 +0000

Try vinegar. When I was little, that’s how we treated swimmers ear (the doctor said to) and it worked. It would also prevent it when we bothered to do it right away. Still, though, q-tips totally belong in your ear.

By: Tisi

Tisi — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 04:52:43 +0000

Really? All of my doctors I had as a child told me to use hydrogen peroxide. It works way better.

By: Tisi

Tisi — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 04:45:49 +0000

“Some chemical” being hydrogen peroxide. I use qtips for my ears quite often and use the hydrogen peroxide once every couple months at most. My ears are clean AND healthy (and hear quite well).

By: Sarah

Sarah — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 03:13:41 +0000

Yeah, about as much as your mother does.

By: n00b pwner

n00b pwner — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 23:27:13 +0000

ear cleaner? xD

By: Grace

Grace — Thu, 28 May 2009 23:21:04 +0000

ME TOO

By: Grace

Grace — Thu, 28 May 2009 23:19:31 +0000

the curved part
but i’ve tried putting the fluffy part in as well
tickles > <

By: Grace

Grace — Thu, 28 May 2009 23:18:55 +0000

me too hehe

By: keelyRAE

keelyRAE — Mon, 04 May 2009 19:17:04 +0000

arg.

i tried to do it the other day with a bobby pin and it didn’t work, my ear just itched.
haha.

By: madalyn

madalyn — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 20:21:26 +0000

well, what sucks for me is that i basically can’t clean out my ears. if i try to clean them out with water, the water does not come out for a couple of days and my ear is plugged the whole time, making it hard for me to hear. and if i try a Q-Tip, even if I barely put it in my ear just the SLIGHTEST bit, my ear is automatically plugged. it is SO annoying!

By: muserox

muserox — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 07:38:29 +0000

YOU DON`T CLEAN YOUR EARS, IT`S BAD FOR THEM!!!!

By: Intyalle

Intyalle — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 20:19:47 +0000

Same. Water in my ears makes me go RAWR.

By: JM

JM — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 06:37:15 +0000

Wow… well, rape me in the a$$, I never knew!

Still going to keep doing it, though.

By: Militarymedic

Militarymedic — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 10:47:17 +0000

Actually the first treatment in medical practice for earwax buildup is:

Olive oil drops for 2-3 days and can be picked up from any pharmacy

assumption is the mother of all FAILS!

By: Thorir

Thorir — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 18:41:36 +0000

You can indeed use Q-tips to clean your ears, but it’s safer using them to clean the outside of the ear, i.e. around the cartilage. Using it in the ear canal can be very dangerous, leading to impacted ear canals and in some cases infection. The safest, and most natural way, is to use warm water and a small bulb syringe like this one:
http://images.imed.com/Products/125/K7278.jpg

Note: You should gently rinse the ear canal with this. Too much pressure either way can be painful and or harmful. Happy cleaning!

By: Strong Bad

Strong Bad — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 00:05:32 +0000

well that was interesting.

do elaborate.

By: badger

badger — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 16:30:14 +0000

I enjoy having my ears clean quite a bit, but am I the only one who finds the act of cleaning them highly unpleasant? I always wind up hacking my lungs out with tears streaming down my face.

By: Ben

Ben — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 06:52:22 +0000

No you couldn’t actually puncture your ear drum it would become
way to painful before hand, what happens is it just shoves ear wax
back further and eventually it can create a blockage and you won’t
be able to hear very well until you pour some time of chemical in it

By: Mike

Mike — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 12:53:45 +0000

Natural things don’t hurt you? WOOHOO!
*Chugs saltwater*

By: Boltonian

Boltonian — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 13:07:55 +0000

Specially trained earwigs; hence their name.

By: caann

caann — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 04:09:38 +0000

friends and you guys SUCK.

By: drunks

drunks — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 19:13:54 +0000

omg that is hiliarious and kinda gross with the cat thing….but i do love to do the q tip tickling in my ear after showers ….

By: Mallory

Mallory — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 07:53:58 +0000

5.5, actually.

By: Scottie

Scottie — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 17:26:39 +0000

I completely agree with that. Think about it….The candle is made of wax. What else are you going to get out of candling but more wax. How gullible are all of these people. Geesh.

By: Somebody Else

Somebody Else — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 19:37:28 +0000

“As olive oil is natural it ought to be ok”

…you really don’t know what you’re talking about, right?
First, olive oil can contain quite a few artificial enhancements, and you can therefore not be sure it’s ‘natural’ at all.
secondly, just because something is natural, that doesn’t mean it isn’t still insanely dangerous and detrimental to your health. Would you clean your ear channels with belladonna? Or even that most natural of all remedies, an unskinned branch?

By: german

german — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 07:11:39 +0000

the “little hairs” are actually on the inside of the eardrum, so unless you ruptured it with the q-tip (and believe me, you have´nt) you cannot touch the hairs. your doc sux!

By: qzumaki

qzumaki — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 22:51:09 +0000

I used to have a cat who loved earwax. We discovered this when he started pulling our used Q-Tips out of the garbage and licking them until the cotton was all loosened. Then he started licking directly in our ears.

That’s how I kept MY ears clean for years…alas, he eventually died of old age (no, NOT from excessive earwax consumption). <:(

By: qzumaki

qzumaki — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 22:49:03 +0000

great pun–did you mean to do that?

By: qzumaki

qzumaki — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 22:47:26 +0000

ME TOO! freaky. “Find a Way.”

By: VIXEN

VIXEN — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 16:54:51 +0000

Which end goes in your ear???

By: Leon

Leon — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 22:49:02 +0000

No, that’s not pleasure, it’s actually you putting the Q-tip in *way* too far and tickling his brain directly.

By: sleeby

sleeby — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 21:55:59 +0000

Same hear… class action lawsuit anybody?

By: asd

asd — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 14:28:44 +0000

Nope. As per Wikipedia (keep in mind not everything may be true), note that when using Qtips you might push the ear dirt back into the ear, when inserting the Qtip, causing a congestion. I guess that if you clean it regularly, dirt cannot build up and as such there is nothing to pushback into the canal.

By: Larry

Larry — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 21:50:39 +0000

Or Lego dudes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waa2ucfgVgQ

By: Alcar

Alcar — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 18:43:41 +0000

Actually, that is a common remedy for people who have “moldy ears”. It’s wen the skin sheds to quickly, you apply vegetable oil to remove it easier.

Wether it actually works…….

By: Alcar

Alcar — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 18:41:13 +0000

suuuure….

Why Candling Can’t Work

Since wax is sticky, the negative pressure needed to pull wax from the canal would have to be so powerful that it would rupture the eardrum in the process. However, candling produces no vacuum. Researchers who measured the pressure during candling of ear models found that no negative pressure was created. The same investigators candled eight ears and found that no ear wax was removed and candle wax was actually deposited in some of them!

By: Alcar

Alcar — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 18:39:54 +0000

Ahum, click the name for a word from people who know what they’re talking about.

By: Chelsey

Chelsey — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 06:45:19 +0000

http://www.qtips.com/family_care.php

Nowhere on the Q-Tips website does it say a use is to clean ears except for “o clean your baby’s outer ear, folds.” That’s crazy lol

By: Barbara

Barbara — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 06:41:57 +0000

Arsenio Hall used to ask people if they used Q-tips in their ears on his talk show. If they said yes, he’d say “Aren’t eargasms the greatest things!?”

On the other hand, my ear doctor has told me that all my years of drying the inside of my ears with Q-tips has permanently damaged the little hairs that reverberate sound waves thus causing the massively annoying tinnitis I now have. Maybe if the package warning had explained that little tidbit of info, my ears might not be ringing at this very moment…

By: Peter

Peter — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 06:28:29 +0000

I always have a ton of wax in my ears, so I use Q-tips to gentle remove the wax. Sometimes it’s really itchy in there so I used to be really aggressive scraping the inside of my ear but avoiding going too deep. But, I got swimmer’s ear from the aggressive swabbing causing a bacterial infection, and had to take ear drops for a week to get rid of the infection. So, please, be gentle everyone!

By: Candystripe Legs

Candystripe Legs — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 05:42:19 +0000

Thats what my doctor told me to do, but I don’t find it does anything.