Most people would take some laxatives when they have constipation, but one man in China turned to a folk remedy and nearly lost his life.
According to several media reports, the 49-year-old man from Guangzhou heard that a live eel was the solution to his problem.
He gave it a try last week and soon found himself in severe pain.
Doctors found that his distended abdomen was full of faeces, food remnants, and a 50-cm-long eel.
They successfully extracted the fish from his bowels which had injured his intestines and abdominal cavity, South China Morning Post reported.
The patient said that he had inserted the eel into his anus after learning of a local folk remedy.
It purported that the slimy fish could lubricate the intestines and help a constipated person to defecate.
Except, this eel managed to slither further up his bowels.
Although this incident seems bizarre, there are other reports of people who were caught in a similar predicament.
In 2012, a man in New Zealand turned up at the emergency department of a hospital in Auckland with an eel lodged inside him, although the reason for his condition remains unknown.
“Doctors and nurses have come across people with strange objects that have got stuck where they shouldn’t be before, but an eel has to be a first,” a hospital source said in the New Zealand Herald report.
Read also: Backed up? Try these natural constipation remedies
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