On Tuesday night, the 42 year old Selvi woke up with an itching sensation in the nasal cavity. “At first, I thought I was coming down with a cold,” said the Chennai resident. But as she felt a wriggling sensation in the nose, she was rushed to four different hospitals before finally doctors at Stanley Medical College retracted the cause of concern – a live cockroach!
At the first hospital Selvi visited, doctors suspected a nasal growth. At the second hospital, a contraption was used to pump it out with water, but failed. At the third hospital, doctors attributed the discomfort to a “foreign body that seemed to be mobile”, and recommended a scan. But it was at the fourth hospital at Stanley that the cause was clear through endoscopy. “It was a full grown cockroach,” said Dr M.N. Shankar, head of the department. “It was in the nasal cavity between the eyes, close to the brain. We had to use a combination of suction and forceps to finally pull it out.”
The process lasted 45 minutes. The department has in the past removed beads, a button cell, leech and chalk piece from nasal cavities. “But not a cockroach, especially not one this large,” said Dr S. Muthuchitra, part of the rescue team.
Selvi is now healthy and free of cockroach in her cavity. Moral of the story, don’t put your nose in someone else’s business!
