The unnamed 61-year-old farmer had experienced worseningtummy pain and an expanded abdomen, vomiting, and constipation for three days before he went to an emergency room in Mannar in northern Sri Lanka.
When he arrived at the hospital, the man was confused, had a fever, and his vital signs suggested that he was sick from an infection in his abdomen, surgeons and anesthesiologists wrote in a case report published in the International Journal of Surgery Case Reports in July.
They took him to the intensive care unit and treated him with antibiotics and fluids.
The surgeons found a 0.8-inch fish bone in his intestine
To find out what was wrong, the surgeons performed open abdominal surgery. It revealed a 0.8-inch hooked fish bone that had caused about a 0.2-inch hole in the furthest part of the man’s small intestine, which was infected.
The authors wrote that the case was “unusual.” Most foreign bodies — such as fish bones, toothpicks, and dentures — pass through the digestive tract without any complications, such as a hole in the intestine or bleeding, they said.
According to the report, foreign bodies commonly get lodged in narrowings or natural angulations of the digestive system, but only about 1% of foreign bodies that get stuck damage the small intestine, and 1% of those need surgical removal.
In this case, the surgeons removed around 4 inches of the man’s intestine and created a temporary stoma to try to treat him, but he didn’t recover.
Eight hours after he arrived at the hospital, the man had a cardiac arrest and died.