Be careful with chicken wings at your Labor Day barbecue.
A man needed life-saving surgery after a piece of bone pierced his appendix, causing internal bleeding.
The 77-year-old Tunisian man went to the doctor complaining of a dull pain in his stomach.
He had no fever, bowel movement changes or abnormal heart rate, leading doctors to suspect he had a mass in his intestine.
But when they did a CT scan, they found a two-centimeter-long piece of bone (about the width of three number two pencils) protruding from his appendix, creating an infection that could have killed him.
The bone, seen here as the dense white line in the center of the four thin red lines, was lodged in the patient’s appendix.
Humans cannot digest chicken bones, but they are brittle, meaning that if ingested, they can break into sharp pieces that can puncture the soft tissue of the gastrointestinal tract.
Doctors had a hard time determining what caused this in the first place because the patient did not remember swallowing anything that might have become lodged in his abdomen, the journal report said. SAGE Open Medical Case Reports saying.
They had to open it up to get the bone out.
They removed his appendix, the chicken bone, sewed it up, and sent him home after monitoring him for four days.
Because the patient was elderly and had no teeth, he may have swallowed the piece without chewing it, so he did not even know what was in store for him, doctors at Charles Nicolle Hospital in Tunis wrote.
At a check-up a year later, doctors confirmed there were no lasting side effects from the incident.
Typically, when someone swallows something they shouldn’t, it can either be expelled from the body or become lodged in the colon or intestines, where doctors often choose to remove it using a long tube called an endoscope.
Objects become trapped in the appendix in only about 1 in 2,000 cases.
Sometimes people with foreign objects in their appendix even have symptoms, which could explain why the patient only had mild discomfort.
In about 11 percent of all cases where an object has become stuck in someone’s appendix, people only discovered they had the object there when they were already undergoing surgery for a different need.
The appendix is a small pouch attached to the end of the intestine and is a somewhat mysterious organ.
Scientists believe it may harbor some of the bacteria the gut needs to aid digestion, but it doesn’t seem to have much use.
Some people are even born without an appendix. You can live without it without noticing much difference.
Which is fortunate, because burst appendicitis is fairly common, happening to 280,000 Americans each year, according to the American Medical Association.
After removing the 2cm piece of bone from the patient, doctors had to remove his appendix.
Appendicitis occurs when a blockage in the intestines causes a buildup of bacteria in the appendix that multiply out of control and cause an infection known as appendicitis.
Sometimes this infection becomes so severe that the pressure of the bacteria causes the small organ to burst.
If left untreated, a ruptured appendix can turn into a life-threatening infection, leading to sepsis that spreads bacteria through the blood and shuts down major organ systems. According to Johns Hopkins .
The Tunisian patient’s appendix had not burst, but it had been perforated, and doctors discovered the wound was infected and could have been life-threatening.
Chicken is one of the most widely consumed meats in the world. It is estimated that the average American eats about 100 pounds of broiler chicken per year. according to the USDA.
Chicken bones cannot be digested by humans, but they are fragile and can break when swallowed, forming sharp pieces that can hurt the intestines. For this reason, medical authorities recommend not swallowing them.
The study’s authors said this case highlights the need for doctors caring for patients with unusual symptoms to ask them about all the factors that could have potentially contributed to their illness.
The authors said: “This case highlights the need for a high index of suspicion for atypical clinical presentations and the ongoing need for research to improve our understanding and management of this rare condition, ultimately improving patient outcomes.”