TIRUVANNAMALAI: Doctors of the Government Tiruvannamalai Medical College Hospital (GTMCH) saved the life of a one-year-old girl child by removing a five-rupee coin stuck in her throat after she had swallowed it.
P Danushka, daughter of Prabu, a resident of Govindampattu in Thandarampattu taluk, swallowed the coin on Saturday. After noticing the child take the coin and put it in her mouth, her parents rushed to stop it but could not do so.
They immediately rushed the baby to the GTMCH where a team of doctors led by S Kamalakannan, ENT and head and neck surgeon, swung into action.
“The X-ray revealed that the coin was stuck in the cricopharynx region. The child had difficulties in swallowing even saliva,” Kamalakannan said.
The medical team decided to remove the coin through ‘laryngoscopy’. Since the child had taken food just before swallowing the coin, the doctors had to wait for about four hours to administer anaesthesia.
“We had to wait for nearly four hours until the stomach became empty to administer anaesthesia,” he said.
Subsequently, the procedure was done to extract the foreign body from the throat.
Kamalakanna noted, “We performed laryngoscopy to carefully remove the foreign body without harming the child.”
The procedure usually takes ten to fifteen minutes but it took about ninety minutes for the baby as it took a longer time for her to regain consciousness.
The baby escaped severe complications as the coin remained stuck in the cricopharynx.
“Had it moved a little down, it would have got into the trachea creating more complications,” the ENT surgeon noted.
The parents had kept the coin on the floor along with pooja articles after performing pooja as it was an auspicious day -- a Saturday in Purattasi month.