Yahoo – AFP, Abhaya Srivastava ,26 Aug 2014
 |
Photo shows
the skeleton of a foetus that had been inside a woman
for 36 years, after being
removed by doctors in India's Nagpur, August 25,
2014 (AFP Photo)
|
New Delhi
(AFP) - Doctors in India have removed the skeleton of a foetus that had been
inside a woman for 36 years in what is believed to be the world's longest
ectopic pregnancy, a doctor has said.
The
60-year-old woman became pregnant at the age of 24 but suffered a miscarriage
because the foetus had been growing outside of her uterus, the doctor told AFP
on Monday.
The woman,
from a poor rural area of central India, was "terrified" of having
surgery at the time to remove the remains of the foetus, and instead sought
medication for the pain at a local clinic.
 |
Photo of a
CT scan showing the skeleton
of a foetus that had been inside a woman
for 36
years, say doctors in India's Nagpur,
August 25, 2014 (AFP Photo)
|
"She
came to us complaining of pain in the abdomen," said Akhtar, head of
surgery at the N.K.P. Salve Institute of Medical Sciences in the city of
Nagpur.
"This
is a case in which the woman got pregnant outside the uterus. She told us she
was pregnant in 1978 and it was a mature pregnancy," he said.
Doctors
felt a lump on her lower right abdomen and feared it could be cancer -- but
further tests and scans revealed a calcified mass.
"Once
we saw the scans, our first reaction was 'what are we dealing with'? It was
actually a matured skeleton encapsulated in a calcified sac," Akhtar said.
"A
60-year-old woman with a foetus lying in her abdomen for 36 years is a medical
marvel. It's something we had never heard about."
The doctors
searched medical literature and discovered a woman in Belgium who had retained
the remains of a foetus for 18 years following an ectopic pregnancy, the
longest they could find on record.
An ectopic
pregnancy occurs when the egg implants outside the uterus, usually in the
fallopian tubes.
A team of
doctors in Nagpur successfully performed surgery to remove the mass that was
lodged between the woman's uterus, intestines and bladder.
Skeletal
remains that were removed are seen in video footage laid out on a hospital bed,
and include numerous parts of a rib cage, leg and arm bones and sections of a
skull, spine and pelvis.
"She
was shocked when she first got to know what had happened. But she is fine now
and is recuperating," Akhtar said.
The footage
shows the grey-haired woman, who has declined to speak with media, resting
comfortably on a hospital bed, and being examined by her team of doctors.
"As
far as this case is concerned, it's the rarest of rare cases and very difficult
to believe," Akhtar said.
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