Doctors find 10cm cement chunk poking its way through man's heart
Doctors in the US have taken a 10cm-long chunk of cement out of a 56-year-old's heart, giving a bizarre explanation as to how it got there in the first place.
In an article published in the New England Journal of Medicine, doctors Gabe Weininger and John Elefteriades described how the man showed up in an emergency room with chest pain and shortness of breath.
When they looked at scans, they found a 10 centimetre long sharp object puncturing his right lung.
WARNING: Graphic image below
The 10cm piece of cement was poking through the man's heart and lung. New England Journal of Medicine
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During surgery doctors pulled the narrow object out of his chest, and found it was a cement embolism.
The cement got there as a complication of a procedure the patient had a week earlier.
In kyphoplasty, polymethylmethacrylate medical cement is injected into the spine of a patient as part of the process of repairing damaged vertebrae.
It appeared the cement had worked its way from the spine into the man's heart.
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Surgeons conducting chest surgery on the man pulled out this 10cm piece of cement. New England Journal of Medicine
"Cement embolism is a described complication of kyphoplasty; the cement can leak into the venous system, harden, and embolise," the article states.
There were no complications from the second procedure, and the man had nearly recovered after a month.
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