5 years old who swallowed 40 gums undergo surgery, stomach blocked
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A four-year-old boy was forced to have an emergency operation to unblock his stomach after swallowing 40 pieces of chewing gum.
The child, from Ohio, US started to develop cramps and diarrhoea after the chewing gum clumped together in his stomach and started to block his digestive operation.
The boy, who has not been named, suffered no long-term effects from the procedure.
However, he was told by medics he was lucky the gum hadn’t blocked his intestines, which could have been fatal.
According to the boy’s mom, on the day of the incident the four-year-old had consumed an entire tub of sugar-free chewing gum.
She immediately called medics who recommended the boy should only go to a local hospital if he had stomach pains.
Just hours later, he developed diarrhoea and stomach pains, which led to the mum taking him to the emergency room.
Medics debated how to treat the boy and eventually decided to remove the mass using multiple “passes” of the oesophagus.
Doctors placed an oesophagoscope, or hollow metal tube, down the throat and used forceps to try and pull off bits of the gum which were later brought back up.
Medics said the procedure took “multiple” attempts to remove the chewing gum as the boy was sedated throughout the operation.
