Some of the oddest things that doctors and other medical professionals witness are the bizarre foreign items that they remove from patients’ bodies.
Maybe There’s a Better Place to Hide the Jewelry?
Quora user Ali Sadek, MS, MA, MD, Ph.D. describes seeing a well-groomed middle-aged woman who presented to the emergency room complaining of stomach ache. The physical examination turned up nothing, but an x-ray of the abdomen showed significant problems. Many jewelry-like things were found in the woman’s stomach and upper small intestine. That’s because they were intended to be worn as ornamentation. To prevent her husband from delivering any of her jewels to his mistress, she kept swallowing the pieces. She should have reviewed the warnings of an unfaithful partner.
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He Got His Money Back
The International Journal of Emergency Medicine included a story about a little kid, aged 4, who swallowed a New Taiwan Dollar. An x-ray revealed that the youngster had successfully ingested the coin. The physicians provided laxatives and monitored the boy’s development for 28 days in an effort to prevent surgery; the dollar went through without incident on day 28.
A Bizarre Use of The Appendix
According to a paper written by three doctors and published in the International Journal of Surgical Case Reports, a guy consumed razor blades for unknown reasons. The 25-year-old prisoner complained of abdominal pain, so guards took him to the hospital, where strangely, X-rays showed razor blades. The fact that the blades had made their way to his appendix was even more peculiar. I bet you didn’t realize that a human stomach can break down a razor blade. Just another one of those obscure scientific truths you missed out on in class.
Keep Track of That Toothpick
According to a recent report in the German medical journal DMW, when a man in his 50s presented to the emergency room complaining of abdominal and urinary tract pain, physicians exhausted all possible explanations before finally diagnosing a urinary tract infection. Ultrasound was the method used to discover the toothpick in the man’s small intestine. There are information gaps that you won’t fill in until you visit the emergency room.
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When Fish Isn’t so Good for You
Fish is great for you, but the bones aren’t as healthy. According to a report in Case Reports in Medicine, doctors discovered a fish bone in the thyroid gland of a 31-year-old woman. Reportedly, when she was eating, a fish bone became trapped in her throat and eventually made its way into her thyroid. Doctors say it’s unusual to identify fish bones as a foreign body. What you think you know about seafood is about to alter after reading these interesting facts.
A Troubling Type of Eating Disorder
Doctors were perplexed when they removed 10 plastic gloves from the rectum of a 55-year-old man with cerebral disabilities. They reported their findings in the journal Case Reports in Surgery, explaining that the patient had been diagnosed with pica. Because people with intellectual disabilities “may not appear conventionally,” the physicians say “special considerations must be considered” when thinking about the consumption of nonfood substances among this demographic.
The Mole that Moved
An elderly woman visited New York City dermatologist Joshua Zeichner, MD, because she was concerned about a mole on her skin that seemed to be developing. After a thorough examination, Dr. Zeichner determined that the “mole” was actually a tick embedded beneath her skin and removed it. Learn the most hilarious stories about visits to the doctor.
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Making Use of A Bullet in An Inventive Way
An acquaintance who works as an emergency room doctor told Malvadere, a Reddit user and writer, that a guy had come in with a live round of ammunition in his rectum. Why? The man, who suffered from severe and irritating hemorrhoids, had been scratching them with a 50 mm bullet. When the bullet got trapped, the doctor called in an expert in weapons for assistance. And we’re willing to guess that you’ve never heard of these outlandish, age-old cures, so don’t let that pass you by.
Sponge-worthy?
BasedOnContent, another Reddit user, reflects on advice given to him by a physician during his time spent learning to be a Rape Crisis Counselor. During his talk on STDs, the doctor got sidetracked by a tale about a patient who came in claiming that she had a sponge stuck in her cervix. The doctor wrongly identified it as a sponge used in contraception. A car-washing sponge, to be precise. The weird parts of the human body that you didn’t know about are up next.