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People Inhaling Strange / Dangerous Objects

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Anonymous

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Peanuts:
Not poisonous as such, but as a small child, I was not allowed to eat peanuts, especially unsupervised, as my folks had got it into their heads that small children were at a very great risk of accidently inhaling them. While this would stand to reason as a hazzard for any small, hard foodstuff, the peanut was more deadly than any other, as peanuts (according to my folks) contained something which reacted with the stuff in your lungs to produce chlorine. Therefore, to get a peanut stuck in your respiratory system was to sign your own death warrent, as the chlorine corroded your lungs, just like some soldier in the trenches in a gas attack (I now think of peanuts every time I read Wilfred Owen).

Is this:

a) Hysteria limited to my folks - bearing in mind anything I have previously revealed about my family's eccentricities in other posts?

b) Hysteria which spread through parents of small children in the late seventies and early eighties?

c) Actually based in fact?
 
My kids weren't allowed peanuts either!

The reason, as I heard, was that peanuts can be inhaled easily into the lungs where they absorb fluid and swell up, causing abscesses. That's if the kid hasn't choked to death first.

Inhaled peanuts can block the respiratory tract and are difficult to dislodge even with the Heimlich manouevre, especially the larger nuts. Worst of all are salted ones, apparently.

Another reason might be the 'play potential' of peanuts. This satisfyingly alliterative aspect of the snack food in question refers to the tendency which people have to flip peanuts up and catch them in their mouths. Children are liable to copy adults whom they've seen doing this, providing them with another method of choking themselves.

Whatever, I kept my home peanut-free until my youngest was 12 or so.

(May I add, I have drunkenly half-choked myself with peanuts several times, using the eating-and-laughing, cram-in-too-many and watch-me-catch-this-one methods.)
 
I wonder whether the peanut = possible death to young children warning is actually based on a genuine warning for people who feed birds?

The advice is to ensure that birds cannot get their beaks on whole peanuts during spring - as they will take them back to their young and just drop them down their throats with no regard to the size of the chick's throat - hence suffocation.

That is why it is best to have wired bird feeders that require the bird to remove only parts of the peanut before flying off to the nest.

It could be that the warning message of peanuts and choking for birds has become transferred into human society by mistake. I cannot think of a possible reason why a nut would be more dangerous than, say a smartie or jelly tot - or all manner of things produced specifically for children.
 
Mon 16 Feb 2004


3:13pm (UK)

Experts Condemn New Craze for 'Snorting' Alcohol

By Sarah Cade, PA News


A new craze for inhaling alcohol was today attacked by medical experts as a potential danger that could cause brain damage.

Drinks including vodka and absinthe can be “snorted” into the nose or inhaled into the mouth through a tube using a new device known as an Alcohol Without Liquid (AWOL) vaporiser.

Scientists estimate that the effects of the alcohol can be felt much quicker as it is directly absorbed through blood vessels in the nose or lungs – bypassing the stomach and liver.

Bristol bar Il Bordello became the first venue to offer its customers the device last week and owner Liz Lewitt said it had proved a hit with drinkers.

The inventor of the Awol machine, Dominic Simler, claims this method of consuming alcohol reduces the effects of a hangover and is calorie-free.

But alcohol experts described the device as “diabolical” and warned that inhaling alcohol could cause serious brain damage.

Professor Oliver James, head of clinical medical sciences at Newcastle University, said: “By snorting the alcohol it can go directly into the brain without being filtered by the liver.

“What is getting into your brain could be the equivalent of many times more than by drinking it.

“This will not only make you very drunk very quickly but is also likely to increase the risk of direct alcohol damage to the brain. This could do irreversible damage to nerves, lead to swelling and possibly lead to dementia in the long term.”

He added that people may also be able to inhale alcohol for 20 minutes, get drunk, drive and still be able to pass a police breathalyser test as alcohol levels in the blood remained very low.

The Automobile Association said Awol would have to be treated like drugs and be subject to rules making it illegal to drive with impaired abilities.

Andrew Howard, head of road safety at the AA Motoring Trust, said: “The law doesn’t just say you must not be over the legal limit, it says you must not drive when you are impaired.”

Mr Simler, 29, from London, said no one should drive after consuming alcohol but refuted claims that the device posed a danger to health.

“There is a built-in safety device as it takes about one hour to inhale one shot of alcohol. It is hardly something people are going to get very drunk on,” he said.

“It is designed to allow people to enjoy the effects of alcohol mixed with oxygen. It promotes a sense of well being and a mild euphoria. It is a fun new legal way to take alcohol.”

Mr Simler adapted the vaporiser from oxygen machines used for aromatherapy and exercise purposes.

The alcohol vapour is created by pouring a spirit into a diffuser capsule connected to an oxygen pipe. The oxygen bubbles are then passed through the capsule, absorbing the alcohol, before being inhaled through a tube.

Mr Simler estimated that he had sold approximately 50 machines, at £1,500 each, to be used specifically for vaporising alcohol.

Bar owner Ms Lewitt said customers using Awol would get “bored before they got drunk” as the amount of alcohol inhaled was so small.

She said she had been overwhelmed with bookings for the device, which is charged at a rate of £6 a shot.

“It is a novelty. People enjoy passing it around in a group. It takes that burning sensation away from the alcohol allowing customers to enjoy the taste of flavoured alcohol,” Ms Lewitt said.

She added that she had not seen anyone react badly to Awol yet but insisted the bar had a zero tolerance policy to bad behaviour.
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http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2538295

I snorted quite a bit of blue label vodka over a decade ago and I'm
 
Mum, I snorted the Christmas tree

Jocelyn Lowinger
ABC Science Online


Wednesday, 15 December 2004


The festive season can be a dangerous time for kids keen to explore and taste new things, like Christmas trees (Image: iStockphoto)

A child who inhaled part of a Christmas tree that got stuck in his lung has made medical history, Canadian doctors say.

The doctors, who described the first case of "Christmas tree aspiration", warned of what could happen at a time of year when children explore and taste new things.

They reported the case in the current issue of the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

The two-and-a-half-old boy had repeated bouts of pneumonia starting from when he was 10 months old, a few months after his first Christmas.

He hadn't choked and there was nothing in the family's medical history that pointed to lung disease.

When doctors at the IWK Health Centre in Halifax, Nova Scotia, x-rayed and performed CT scans of the boy's chest, they found a lump at the outer edge of his right lung.

When they operated, they found part of a branch from an evergreen tree wedged there, 3 centimetres long and 0.5 centimetres round.

This had blocked off part of the lung, causing the repeated bouts of pneumonia. Once the blockage was removed, the child made a full recovery.

Peanuts, toys, dinosaurs
Australian paediatric respiratory and sleep specialist Dr Dominic Fitzgerald said food, especially small bits of peanuts, was the most common cause of children choking and breathing in small objects.

But the doctor, from The Children's Hospital at Westmead in Sydney, said this didn't just occur at Christmas.

"It is a year round phenomenon," he said. "The oddest things I've seen [inhaled] are a plastic toy dinosaur ... and a set of rosary beads from a child in a particularly devout family."

He'd also seen a run of boys over five who'd inhaled the tips of pens while rocking on chairs.

Fitzgerald also advised carers to keep a close eye on what small children put into their mouths around times of birthdays as they could accidentally breathe in small bits of toys given to older brothers and sisters.

And like the Canadian boy, not all children choke when they breathe in small objects.

He said parents could be concerned if their child had once breathed in something and had repeated chest infections.
Click to expand...

Source
 
Shocked Russian surgeons open up man who thought he had a tumour... to find a FIR TREE inside his lung
By Will Stewart
Last updated at 11:43 AM on 14th April 2009

Shocked Russian surgeons claim they found a five-centimetre fir tree growing inside a man's lung as they operated on him for suspected cancer.
The amazing discovery apparently was made when they opened up Artyom Sidorkin, 28, to remove what they thought was a serious tumour.
Sidorkin had complained of extreme pain in his chest and had been coughing up blood. Doctors were convinced he had cancer, Russian website mosnews.com reported.

'We were 100 per cent sure,' said surgeon Vladimir Kamashev from Izhevsk in the Urals. 'We did X-rays and found what looked exactly like a tumour.

'I had seen hundreds before, so we decided on surgery.'
Surgeons claim this is the fir tree growing inside the man's lung after it was removed
Before removing part of the man's lung, the surgeon investigated the tissue - and said they found what looked like grown fir tree needles in it.
'I thought I was hallucinating,' said Kamashev.
'I asked my assistant to have a look: 'Come and see this - we've got a fir tree here'. He nodded in shock.

'I blinked three times, sure I was seeing things,' he told the Komsomolskaya Pravda Daily.
The report also appeared in popular tabloid Komsomolskaya Gazeta, and was picked up by Russian news service Novosti.

Medical staff - arguing that a five-centimetre branch is too big to be swallowed - believe Sidorkin had somehow inhaled a seed, which later sprouted into a small fir tree inside his lung.
An X-ray of a lung with a real tumour inside it
The explanation echoes what children are often jokingly told by their elders: That if you swallow the seeds of a fruit or vegetable it may grow inside you.

The spruce, which was apparently touching the man's capillaries and causing severe pain, was removed, they said.

'It was very painful. But to be honest I did not feel any foreign object inside me,' Sidorkin was quoted as saying.

'I'm so relieved it's not cancer.'

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldne ... -lung.html

Hmm..Is it 1st April in the Julian calendar....?

See Also:
Trees / Plants Growing Inside You
https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/trees-plants-growing-inside-you.37355/
 
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This woman inhaled a sewing pin into her lung and it could have killed her.
She needed an operation:

Experience: I inhaled a pin into my lung

I drove to a nearby radiology clinic and went straight into x-ray. While I was waiting for the results, the radiologist came back ashen-faced: "You didn't swallow it – you inhaled it. It's in your right lung. You need to go to the hospital. Now!"

...

I was off work for a month, had trouble using my right arm and lost sensation in my right breast, which has never recovered to this day – I swallowed the pin in 1985. Yet I did feel lucky. When I eventually got back to work, I had a very dubious celebrity status.

I still have the pearl-headed culprit in a container provided by the hospital. And I now shriek if I ever see anyone with a pin in their mouth – I have a six-inch scar on my back to remind me that, no matter how silly the action, the ramifications can be huge.
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It's a good read, recommended.
 
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This two-year-old Missouri child nearly died after inhaling a rock.
Two-year-old making tremendous recovery after inhaling rock

A two-year-old boy from Ozark is making remarkable progress after suffering complications from inhaling a rock.

Caleb and Savannah Slater said their son, Ryker, inhaled the rock a little more than two weeks ago while at daycare.

The rock, they said, settled above Ryker’s right lung.

“They said that his heart stopped for four minutes and they were doing CPR in the field,” said Caleb. “Then they were able to get him back. They transported him to the hospital, where when we were at the hospital, his heart stopped again, this time for eight minutes. They were able to get him back again, thankfully.”

After going to the hospital in St. Louis, doctors were unsure if Ryker was going to live or if he was ever going to come off a ventilator.

Now, they said doctors are optimistic about a full recovery. ...
Click to expand...
FULL STORY: https://www.ozarksfirst.com/local-n...king-tremendous-recovery-after-inhaling-rock/
 
EnolaGaia said:
This two-year-old Missouri child nearly died after inhaling a rock.

FULL STORY: https://www.ozarksfirst.com/local-n...king-tremendous-recovery-after-inhaling-rock/
Click to expand...
I'm suspicious.

Caleb and Savannah Slater said their son, Ryker, inhaled the rock a little more than two weeks ago while at daycare.

The rock, they said, settled above Ryker’s right lung.


1. When a news report uses that term '(Whoever) said this or that', it's because the journalist thinks they're lying.

2. A child can inhale a small object without adults noticing and suffer no ill effects right away, until the foreign body causes an obstruction or infection. Sounds to me like the parents here are, to put it politely, jumping to conclusions.

There may of course be information in the full report that proves me wrong but it's not available to read here.
 
This man inhaled a dental drill bit deep into a lung. Doctors had to use a novel tool (not usually used for such things) to extract it.
Patient inhales 1-inch dental drill bit during procedure

What began as a routine dental visit landed an Illinois man in a Kenosha hospital after he inhaled the dentist's drill bit.

A rare medical procedure was performed to remove the sharp metal object lodged in the patient's lung. ...

An inch-long dental drill bit was lodged deep in Tom Jozsi's lung. ...

"I was at the dentist getting a tooth filled, and then next thing I know I was told I swallowed this tool," Jozsi said. "I didn't really even feel it going down. All I felt was a cough. When they did the CT scan they realized, you didn't swallow it. You inhaled it."

Doctors believe that inhaling just before he coughed sent the metal object deep into the 60-year-old maintenance worker's airways.

It went so deep, pulmonary expert Dr. Abdul Alraiyes said, that normal scopes couldn't reach it.

"When I saw the cat scan, and where that object is sitting, it was really far down on the right lower lobe of the lung," Alraiyes said.

"What happens if he can't get it out? And the answer really was, part of my lung was going to have to get removed," Jozsi said.

That's when Alraiyes and the Aurora Medical Center-Kenosha team decided to try a newer device — one not designed for removing foreign objects. ...

Video of the scan shows the medical team was able to navigate the narrow airways, reach the drill piece and pull it out without any harm to the patient.

"I was never so happy as when I opened my eyes, and I saw him with a smile under that mask shaking a little plastic container with the tool in it," Jozsi said. ...
Click to expand...
FULL STORY (With Photo): https://www.wisn.com/article/patient-inhales-1-inch-dental-drill-bit/39754329
 
This young Australian man was a teen in 2015 when he inhaled a piece of dry breakfast cereal which punctured and collapsed one lung.
Experience: I punctured my lung by eating cereal

I was 16, on a family holiday to Malaysia in 2015. My parents and I were staying at a resort in Kuantan on the east coast. It was just me and Dad at the buffet that morning; we were keen to wolf down a quick breakfast so we could reserve a spot by the pool before it got too busy. Dad grew up in Malaysia, so we used to visit quite often, and whenever I was there I would look forward to a nice bowl of Honey Stars. ...

They’re honey-flavoured, star-shaped pellets of sugary goodness – a treat for the growing teenager I was. I had them every morning of the trip the same way I eat any cereal: without milk. I never got on board the milk-and-cereal bandwagon because it makes everything too soggy, though soggy wouldn’t have been the end of the world, considering what happened next. ...

I was about a third of the way into an admittedly enormous bowl when suddenly, mid-mouthful, I felt an excruciating pain under my shoulder blade; it was as if someone had come up from behind and stabbed me. Within seconds, my moaning and groaning caused heads to turn. Dad kept telling me to pull myself together because half the resort was staring at us, but the pain wouldn’t let up, so I decided to head back to my room to try to sort myself out.

Walking back, I must have looked as if I had drunk 15 beers. I was trying to walk in a straight line but keeling over every few metres. Once I was in my room, I spent the next 20 minutes writhing about on the floor, until the pain stopped as abruptly as it had begun. Over the next week, I experienced shortness of breath going up and down stairs, and when I tried to hold my breath underwater, I would feel a little bit of pain in my shoulder. ...
Click to expand...
FULL STORY: https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2022/may/06/experience-punctured-lung-eating-cereal
 
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