A woman swallowed a piece of wire from her braces, and ended up in the ER 10 years later
(Mirror Daily, United States) – A team of Australian surgeons have recently removed a seven centimeters long piece of wire from a woman’s stomach. She came to the emergency room after experiencing severe stomach pain and, after undergoing a CT scan, she found she had somehow swallowed a piece of wire from her braces.
The scan revealed a piece of wire in the woman’s stomach
A 30-year-old woman came to the Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital in Perth, Australia, and complained of extreme stomach pain. Doctors decided to perform a CT scan and see what could have caused her affliction, and made a weird discovery.
They observed how she had a piece of metal in her abdomen, which resembled a wire. When questioned about it, the woman said she used to wear braces. Therefore, the only explanation was that she had swallowed a piece of wire from it. However, what’s worrying is the fact that the woman has had the metal in her bowels for 10 years or more.
The woman wasn’t aware she had swallowed a part of her braces
Both the patient and the doctors were amazed to make such a discovery, as none of them was expecting it to be a piece of metal. Often, patients come to the emergency room with such stomach pain after swallowing fish bones which then perforate the bowels. However, the CT scan showed it was something else this time.
Fortunately, the wire didn’t cause any severe damage to the woman’s stomach. Usually, these kinds of objects might be dangerous if the person doesn’t come to the hospital early. However, the woman wasn’t aware a piece of her braces actually ended up in her stomach.
It doesn’t happen really often that someone should swallow wires from braces without knowing. The only possible case would be if the person were under anesthesia, but it is still highly unlikely that something like this should happen.
Image Source: Flickr
Melissa Gansler
