In an extraordinary and disturbing story, a medical case of a 58-year-old Haikou man could be described as outrageous. Why? He woke up feeling like something was crawling into his nose; only in a subsequent visit to the hospital did doctors find a cockroach stuck in his windpipe.
The Sunday Herald Sun is the source of the complete details of this ‘From Vault’ feature. The incident began on a day when the man had retired to bed at night. He coughed frantically in an attempt to clear the blockage, but when that did not help, he simply forgot about it and went back to sleep.
‘Unusual stale odor’
For the next three days lying down on his bed was as exasperating as ANYTHING in life could be for the man who had suffered ear paralysis for three weeks during the huang cam ling period. Although he was maintaining the orahygiene he started to observe a strange whiff of odour which was unusual for him. He started producing yellow phlegm which finally lead him to go to a doctor. At first, he was seen by an ENT who did not confirm the presence of an aspiration in the upper airways. Then, the respiratory symptoms continued and he decided to see Dr Lin Ling in Hainan Hospital who specializes in this field.
A shocking diagnosis
Chest CT scan demonstrated the presence of a suspicious shadow on the lower lung lobe which made an impression that there was some object present inside the lung. Dr Lin suggested doing bronchoscopy to clarify the situation. The findings were very unexpected.
As the doctor reported to Seehua.com, “I remember the procedure very well because at this stage, I saw something with wings in the bronchus.” “It was encasulated under a thick layer of phlegm and, when we removed it, the foreign body turned out to be a cockroach.”
Cockroach extracted from trachea
The transgression insect was removed from the man’s breathing throat; and meticulous cleaning of that region eliminated foul-smelling symptoms in the poor patient. His recovery was full and he was discharged the next day.
Even if it is very difficult rarely, Dr Lin said if anyone feels there is a foreign object inside the respiratory tract, it is best to go to the hospital to eliminate all possible risks.
