These people, I tell you....!

So some time ago, this guy walks into the hospital complaining of tummy pains and constipation, and is sent over to the casualty unit. After giving the same story to the examining doctor, he reluctantly agrees to a rectal examination. The doctor is quite peplexed to find first a sili sili bag, and then a hard immovable object stuck "up there". Frantic x-trays were taken.

Picture quiz... can you guess what this is?

After stern questioning by the senior doctor, the patient mumbles something about a perfume bottle, and says he was assaulted by rouges (brandishing said perfume bottle) who had also robbed his house the previous night. Various methods were tried in order to get the bottle out... including a pair of obstetrics (delivery) forceps hastily borrowed from the nearby OBG ward, but to no avail. The patient was finally wheeled to surgery, sliced open and relieved of the offending object.

Of course, this account won't be complete without mentioning a famous story by one of my Profs. who never fails to regale successive generations of medical students with his wit and wisdom. Apparently while examining a similar patient, he had noticed a faint buzzing against his fingers... at which point he had asked the patient whether he wanted the vibrator taken out, or whether he simply wanted the batteries changed! After the operation (or so the Prof. claims) the vibrator had gone mysteriously missing. He then goes on to say he strongly suspects the ward nurses to have filched it for their own diversion...! (Of course, all these is said in a spirit of humour, esp. when Ms. A, one of the senior nurses, is present. She usually laughs and shakes her head - I think she has heard the story far too often to react in any other way!)

According to the 25th edition of A Short Practice of Surgery by Baily & Love, "The variety of foreign bodies that have found their way into the rectum is hardly less remarkable than the ingenuity displayed in their removal". It then goes on to describe the discovery and removal of turnips, pepper-pots, glass tumblers, screwdrivers and live artillery shells, just to name a few...

Ah well... and life goes on....