San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1889-05-20
SHE SWALLOWED A PIN.
PAINFUL RESULTS OF ONE OF Wo-
MEMS BAD HABITS.

Dangers of Carrying Pins in the Mouth.
Broken Needles Left Where Crawling
Children Can Pick Them Up-several
Serious Gases Rotated.
Women have one bad habit at least which
seems fixed and Observation-Disclosures Of holding
pins and needles in their mouths. He who
has even fair idea Of the inner structure OF
the body must feel cold chill running down
his back whenever he sees this habit INDUCED,
for he can appreciate the possible consequence
if one of these bits OF brass or steel happens
to pass from under the control Of the tongue
and enters the passage to the stomach or the
windpipe.
As a rule, when that mishap occurs, the
pin or needle is swallowed, but no small num-
Der of cases are on record where they have
passed into the windpipe and eventually fallen
to the bronchial tubes. Such an accident as
that is, Of course, always very serious, and
doubiy so if its occurrence 10 not Immediately
recognized, and the means Of relief applied
without delay One would naturally suppose
that severe symptoms must at once be excited
when foreign body passes into the wind
pipe Such is not the case, however. Often
the immediate distress caused is comparative
.ly trifing, and soon largely if not entirely
disappears The period of relief is usually
not long, for the pin or needle, or whatever
it is, sets up more or less irritation, of which
cough. etc, give evidence While the same
lies loosely in the air passagelits removal by
the mouth is Ditch possible. But when i'm.
bedde1 in the tissues such operation does not
promise well, and it is frequently necessary
to open the windpipe-in other words to per
form tracheotOmy-and even then success Is
by no means always assured.
Probably where pins are swallowed, in the
majority Of cases they make their way out of
the system through the intestinal canal. But
that is rarely the case, II not exceptional,
where needles are swallowed The instances
on record where needles and pins have been
swallowed, and years after have made their
way through the different tissues to the sur
face of the body, and, 10 the most unlikely
parts of it, are almost numberleSs Some
recently reported have unusual interest. One
case occurred in the practice of Dr. Kune
The patient, 20 years old, had been suffering
for many weeks from pain in the region OF
the heart, attended with violent palpitation
upon making any considerable exertion. Not
a moment passed, unless he was asleep, that
he was not tormented with an indescribably
oppressed feeling about the chest. In making
an examination of the chest after the cloth
ing had been removed the doctor discovered
a small hardened elevation over the heart.
1t was not visible when looking at the chest,
but it could readily be felt with the finger or
the fat surface Of the hand pressed gently
upon it and moved upward and downward.
A small incision was made over the point in
question and through that was drawn out an
ordinary sewing needle an inch and one-halt
in length.
All the unpleasant symptoms very soon
subsidized and in a week or two the patient
was well The doctor assumed that, from
the location of the needle and the attending
symptoms, it had been for a time in the very
substance of the heart. In another instance
a girl II years old visited physician and in
formed him that she thought there was a
needle in her arm, for she was sure she felt it.
She described its position-one end just un
der the skin and the other deep in the muscles
near the bone She said she had never run a
needle into her arm, or in any other part OF
her body Considering that, the case to the
doctor seemed one Of vivid imagination. He,
however, made a careful examination, and at
eign body in the arm, and, more than prob
ably, such a one as the girl suspected. After
making an incision he took out needle two
inches long. The point was broken off and
the whole needle mClOSed in a capsule. 1t
proved that il lay as the girl had described,
and one end-the point-was near the bone
Subsequently the mother of the patient testi
fed that when her child was years old she
swallowed needle. The same evidently
passed down between the muscles of the neck
and the shoulder and down the arm. 1t lay
in about the middle of it when removed
BABIES AND BROKEN NEEDLES
The physician in this case reports two
others Of equal interest, one that of man
who had a needle journeying around his body
for seven years. One day, in taking his coat
OFF, he felt a sharp pain IN his arm. On max
ing an examination he found that at last the
needle had come to the surface and, protrud-
ing through the skin of his arm, had caught
in the lining of his coat sleeve. The other
case was of no less interest. 1t was that of a
young woman IS years of age. One day,
while taking dancing lesson and waltzing,
she was suddenly attacked with a most ex-
cruciating pain in the lower part of the alb
domen on one side. She at once became I'M
conscious, and her appearance was such as to
terrify all around her
AS soon as she could be removed to her
home a physician was called After an ex-
animation he was convinced that under the
place where she felt the pain there was some
foreign body. He eventually operated and
drew out of the abdomen portion of a nee
die measuring ~ inches in length. In this
case the patient had no knowledge of ever
having swallowed anything like a pin or
needle, and was positive no needle had ever
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