While pounding vegetables, a nine-year-old boy missed with the pestle and amputated part of his genitals in the process.
The case of the physician in the journal “Urology Case Reports” reporting is not for the faint of heart. It is regarding a boy who wanted to help his mother in the kitchen and finally ended up with a partial amputation of his genitals in an emergency. “When he was pounding vegetables, the child hit his penis with a pestle,” said the team led by Natacha Boumas, a pediatric surgeon at the Center Hospitalier Universitaire mere enfant Fondation Jeanne Ebori in Libreville, Gabon.
The nine-year-old had been delivered from another hospital to an emergency, where he had already been prepared for an operation, according to the case report. He was in “good general condition”. During the examination, a partial amputation of the glans with a complete tear of the urethra was found.
Blessing in disguise
The team washed and incised the severed urethra and connected the two sections with a catheter, following which he was given antibiotic therapy. The treatment was successful: following 25 days, the boy might be discharged so that he might continue to recover. A year later he was completely and “aesthetically acceptable” healed.
According to Boumas and her colleagues, penile injuries in children are intermittent injuries, often resulting from accidental circumcisions, animal bites, and zipper lacerations. Such are difficult to deal with. “These are rare but often serious emergencies.”
The less severe these are, the fewer problems there are with treatment, according to the experts. It “results in better esthetic and functional outcomes.” Severe cases, on the other hand, might lead to complications and are a challenge.
