Further Confessions of a GP

Two anaesthetists, a surgeon and a nurse operated on Karla in an attempt to dislodge the live grenade. The team wore no protective clothing and risked their lives during the four-hour operation. It had to be done under local anaesthetic, which meant that poor Karla was awake for every second. It was a success. Karla has a scar on her face and has lost half her teeth, but she is now alive and well. To those brave Mexican medics, I salute you. You are much, much, much braver than me!

Amazingly, Karla Flores isn’t the only person who has required the surgical removal of live ammunition from her person…

Foreign bodies

…According to urban legend, an old World War Two veteran was admitted to a London hospital with a live artillery shell lodged up his rectum. He had apparently been struggling with large haemorrhoids, the worst of which would hang down and get stuck on the seam of his underpants. In order to rectify this nuisance, the resourceful old chap would use an old artillery shell he had lying around to push the haemorrhoid back up into his rectum. This technique worked well for some time until the shell got stuck and he had to hobble to the local emergency department for it to be removed. It was only when the doctor was about to stick his fingers in the gent’s rectum to remove the shell that he casually mentioned that the shell was still live. Apparently the bomb squad were called and they constructed a protective lead box around his anus and then defused the shell while it was still up his bottom.

For most of us, the idea of placing any sort of foreign object up our anuses is objectionable, but it is in fact a surprisingly common A&E presentation. So much so these days that it may barely raise a snigger from your seasoned emergency medics. However, there is no getting away from the fact that everyday household items stubbornly wedged in a rectum make for fabulous X-rays. There was a time when copies of these precious X-ray films were kept hidden away in the secret drawer of the head radiologist, but with the advent of the internet, we are all now just a few clicks away from being able to enjoy their irresistible attraction. My personal favourites are:

1. A key (I’m always losing mine, but hopefully not there)

2. A torch

3. A mobile phone (apparently there were several missed calls before it was removed)

4. A jar of peanut butter

5. A handgun

6. A light bulb (like a eureka moment, but in reverse)

7. A pint glass

8. Cement (it went in as liquid, but didn’t stay that way for long)

9. A perfume bottle

10. A vibrator and a pair or salad tongs (when the vibrator got stuck, rather than bother the busy A&E staff the patient decided to remove the dildo himself using a pair of salad tongs… until these got stuck too!)

Retrieving the gerbil

Before finally leaving the essential medical subject of funny bum stories, it would be a travesty not to mention the marvellous story of the two gents who ended up in the severe burns unit of a Salt Lake City hospital.

As part of their foreplay, Eric and Andrew frequently enlisted the aid of their pet gerbil Raggot. Eric inserted a cardboard tube into Andrew’s anus and then slipped Raggot in. Normally Raggot would make his own exit, but on one occasion he refused to leave the relative comfort of Andrew’s back passage. While peering into the tube, Eric decided to strike a match, hoping that the light might attract Raggot and lead to his departure. Unfortunately the match ignited a pocket of intestinal gas and a flame shot out of the tube setting fire to Eric’s hair and severely burning his face. Raggot the gerbil was also set alight and with his whiskers and fur ablaze went on to ignite a larger pocket of gas further up the intestinal tract. The resulting explosion propelled poor Raggot out of Andrew’s anus like a cannonball. As well as second-degree burns to his face, Eric suffered a broken nose from the impact of being hit directly in the face by a rocket-propelled gerbil. Andrew suffered first- and second-degree burns to his anus and lower intestinal tract. The extent of Raggot’s injuries were not documented.

The chemical cosh