As we reported recently, a new online survey of more than 7,500 U.S. adults came to the astonishing conclusion that a quarter of people who were grooming their private parts themselves were injuring themselves. And the kind of injury you could get from it is a lot more serious than you realize.

The survey found that 67 percent of men and 85 percent of women practice some sort of pubic grooming, and 26 percent of them injure themselves. Women were slightly more likely than men to do so. Most of the injuries were minor, like cuts and burns, but sometimes a person has to be hospitalized.

When does this happen? When a cut that you make while grooming yourself becomes infected — and you don’t want an infection down there. If you cut yourself, it’s important to immediately wash the area with anti-bacterial soap and apply cortisone in order to prevent an infection from happening. Otherwise, it could turn into a medical emergency that could see you spending some time in the hospital.

In addition, those cuts can result in a greater risk of sexually transmitted diseases, so if you do get a cut while grooming, you need to treat it seriously.

“Pubic hair grooming is a widespread practice and about a quarter of people who groom reported grooming-related injuries in a national survey, according to a new article published by JAMA Dermatology,” JAMA Network Journals said in a statement. “A better understanding of how grooming may lead to injury is warranted because of the high prevalence of pubic hair grooming. Benjamin N. Breyer, M.D., M.A.S., of the University of California, San Francisco, and coauthors conducted a web-based survey designed to be representative of the U.S. population to collect data on grooming behavior.”