Post by dksnj on Mar 17, 2022 13:30:06 GMT
(picture of tumbler at link)
A woman who doctors thought had a UTI actually had a glass tumbler stuck in her bladder for four years.
The 45-year-old had come to the hospital complaining of typical lower UTI (urinary tract infection) symptoms, such as leaking.
But doctors were left stunned when scans revealed there was a glass inside her bladder.
It was encased by an 8cm-wide bladder stone, which are normally so small they are hard to see with the naked eye.
The woman, from Tunisia, revealed she had used the drinking glass as a sex toy a number of years before.
Evidently, she had inserted it into the urethral – the hole which females urinate from – rather than the vagina.
Her case was published in a medical journal, including the astonishing scan and an image of the glass and bladder stone.
While the medical report does not mention it, the woman may have been practicing what’s known as “urethral sounding“.
The risky activity involves inserting a glass or object into the urethra – the tube that urine passes through – to “heighten sexual pleasure and arousal”, Wed MD reports.
Doctors have had reports of people deliberately placing things there, either due to mental health problems or for pleasure – but it is not recommended.
The report noted: “The motivations most frequently associated with the presence of foreign bodies within the bladder are of a sexual or erotic nature.
“Various objects have been inserted into the bladder and many patients fail to remove them themselves and are very embarrassed to seek medical advice, which is the origin of a clinical picture which is most often atypical which occurs in a patient particular terrain.”
A scan of the woman's abdomen revealed a large bladder stone with a glass encased.
A scan of the woman’s abdomen revealed a large bladder stone with a glass encased inside.
Courtesy of Ahmed Chaabouni, et
The patient arrived at the emergency department at Academic Hospital Habib Bourguiba complaining of UTI symptoms.
She reported that she had suffered cystitis (inflammation of the bladder) several times, but it had never been investigated.
The woman didn’t have any blood in her urine, nor was she suffering with urinary incontinence, the report said.
But she did have a higher than normal red blood cell range, indicating the body was fighting an infection.
Bladder stones are very small, usually no more than a few cms wide – this patient’s was 8cm.
They develop from hard masses of minerals that grow when urine is not properly emptied from the bladder.
However, they can grow around foreign object lodged in the bladder, for example, a glass tumbler.
In this case, doctors performed surgery to remove the bladder stone.
They then cracked it open to expose the – still intact – glass, that had been in her body for years.
Two days later the woman had recovered and was well enough to go home.
The report concluded: “Complicated forms are those diagnosed late and often associated with recurrent urinary tract infections, lithiasis and/or fistulas.
“The best treatment remains preventive by balancing the underlying etiopathogenic disorder and by a good sex education.”
