We have heard of all kinds of strange fetishes people have. Especially as kids, we ate chalk or sand and since we heard about it too often, it was not very unusual. However in a case of absolute bizarre, doctors in Punjab were left stunned, when they found these, in a man’s stomach.
Yes, 40 knives, recovered from a man’s stomach. The patient, a 42 year old man from Punjab, swallowed these knives because he had an uncontrollable urge to eat them.
The doctor who led the operation told CNN,
“He had a wild urge to consume metal. Even for us, the experienced surgeons, it was frightening. We were so nervous, a small mistake could have taken the patient’s life. In my 20 years of practice, I have never seen anything like it.”
The doctors found knives in his X-ray after he complained of acute abdomen pain and weight loss.
The surgeons found both folded and unfolded knives, with some that had even begun rusting.
The patient told CNN,
“I don’t know why I used to swallow knives, I just enjoyed its taste and I was addicted … how people get addicted to alcohol and other things, my situation was similar.”
It took close to two days for the doctors to come up with a surgical plan and five excruciating hours to finally remove those knives successfully.
While the doctors described it as the strangest case they had ever come across, the phenomenon is really not new. He could have been suffering from a rare disorder called, Pica, characterised by an appetite for non-nutritive substances such as hair, paper, ice, lead etc.
He is now said to be out of danger and will be discharged only after getting clearance from the psychiatrists.
The next time you are hungry, don’t eat metal.