A 23-year-old man who sought medical care for pain and indigestion discovered that the source of his agony was a cockroach in his small intestine.
More specifically, a live cockroach.
“For the last two, three days, the patient was suffering from indigestion and bloating after eating food. It was during routine inspections that we incidentally spotted the cockroach,” Dr. Shubham Vatsya, Senior Consultant, Gastroenterology, said, according to Indian Express.
Vatsya shared that they removed the cockroach — which measured 3 centimeters in length, roughly the length of a U.S. penny — during an endoscopy at Fortis Hospital in New Delhi, India.
Once they found it, "we immediately proceeded to extract the insect,” Vatsya said, citing numerous health concerns.
“We activated the suction button on the scope, effectively sucking the cockroach into the suction channel, -
leading to its removal from the body and saving the man’s life,” Vatsya said.
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The patient had no idea that he’d consumed the cockroach, which managed to stay alive not only after being eaten — but also, after being sucked out in the endoscopy tube.
“Even we were surprised as to how the cockroach managed to stay intact,” said Vatsya.
Cockroaches are a well-known vector for disease, according to the National Library of Medicine, which lists a host of pathogens the insects carry, including E. Coli, Staphylococcus, Salmonella, Rotavirus, Aspergillus, and more.
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