Further Information for Practitioners
Home Visits / Mobile Working
You must be registered with Dartford Borough Council at a premises, even if you plan to occasionally undertake home visits to carry out a skin piercing procedure. You will need to liaise with a Health and Safety Officer in Environmental Health Services.
In general terms, home visits must meet the requirements of the byelaws and associated codes of practice as far as reasonably practicable without compromising client safety.
Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1982, sections 14(2) and 15(2).
Age and Consent Issues
Currently a person must be 18 years of age to have a tattoo. Tattooists should make every effort that persons requesting tattoos are over the age of 18 years. It is not sufficient to simply ask them their age. As a minimum standard the client should be asked to produce appropriate proof of age such as driving license or passport. A record of any identification seen should be made on the consent form.
There is no statutory age limit for ear-piercing or cosmetic body piercing.
Piercing practitioners are expected to adopt reasonable age restrictions however, which could include:
- Allowing no body piercing below the age of 18 years (except perhaps ears, nose and navel)
- Ensure proof of identification is obtained where appropriate
- Obtain written parental consent for piercing 16 to 18 year olds
- If under 16 years, piercing only with a parent or guardian present, in addition to written consent being provided.
The law on indecent assault states that a female under the age of 16 years cannot give consent for nipple or genital piercings, and a male under the age of 16 years cannot consent to genital piercings.
Record Keeping and Client Confidentiality
Skin piercers should maintain records of all clients and procedures carried out. Records should be kept for at least three years and should include:
- Name of client
- Address and telephone number of client
- Age and date of birth of client
- Procedure to be carried out (a history of any previous tattoos and / or piercings may be beneficial)
- Date the procedure is carried out
- Name of the practitioner carrying out the procedure
- Appropriate health information (this should be discussed with the client in confidence and recorded with mutual agreement).
Health information may include epilepsy, haemophilia, any skin conditions e.g. psoriasis, blood thinning medications, implants.
- Written consent; and
- Type of jewellery used (if applicable)
This is not an exhaustive list and recording of any information is at the discretion of the practitioner with the consent and knowledge of the client.
An accident book should be maintained, and any accidents and incidents, including any needle stick injuries, should be recorded.
All information recorded, including the consent, is subject to controls under the Data Protection Act and before disposing of records they should be shredded.
What do I need to know about waste?
If you wish to use Dartford Borough Council’s service for clinical waste, further information is available on our recycling information pages.
All forms of waste are categorised in law and there is specific legislation for the provision of means for safe storage and disposal of substances hazardous to health.
A micro-organism (and therefore anything contaminated by micro-organsims) which creates a hazard to health of any person is a substance hazardous to health and subject to the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 (COSHH).
As such, any tissue, swabs and sharps arising from the practice of skin piercing are ‘controlled waste’ and subject to specific regulations covering segregation, collection, transportation and disposal.
Clinical waste must be kept apart from general waste and must only be disposed / removed from the premises to a licensed clinical waste incineration or landfill by a contractor licensed with the Environment Agency (Waste Management Licensing Regulations 1994).
Segregation of waste is categorised into five groups but only the following two apply to skin piercing practitioners:
- Group A – all human tissue, including blood (whether infected or not) and all related swabs and dressings must be placed in a clinical waste bag which are type approved under the requirements of the Carriage of Dangerous Goods (Classification, Packaging and Labelling) and Use of Transportable Pressure Receptacles Regulations 1996 (yellow in colour).
- Group B – discarded syringe needles, cartridges, broken glass and other contaminated disposable sharp instruments or items, must be placed in a robust sharps container conforming to BS7320: 1990 (yellow in colour).
All clinical waste in groups A and B must be incinerated at a clinical waste incinerator.
The waste must be properly classified according to its main hazard.
For infectious substances the main hazard for carriage is always its infectious property even though it may also possess other hazardous properties such as toxicity or flammability.
A United Nations number (usually UN 3291) should also be marked on all waste receptacles.
All producers of clinical waste have a duty of care to ensure that waste is managed properly whilst on their premises and disposed of safely, and includes:
- Waste must be identified and described so that appropriate containers, suitably labelled are used for its storage and collection
- These containers should be available at every place where sharps are used or soft clinical waste produced. Sufficient stocks should be available at all times so that it is never necessary to overfill them.
- Clinical waste is only collected by a licensed contractor and a transfer note is completed and signed by both waste producer and collector.
- Transfer notes must identify the waste, time and place of transfer and name / address of transferor and transferee.
- The transferor and transferee shall each keep the written description of the waste and transfer note for a period of two years.
- Storage facilities should be lockable and provided with a biohazard warning sign. Suitable personal protective equipment must be provided for handling the waste.
- Where temporary storage facilities are provided they must be appropriate to enable the waste to be kept secure against spillage / leaking or damage by vermin, vandals or children etc.
- Waste producers should be aware if their waste is passed on to a third party, of the address and license number of the clinical incinerator it is taken to.
