Home Removal of Foreign Bodies from Orifices

The two orifices into which small children have a tendency to stuff foreign bodies - beads, sponge, crumbs, sweets and much else besides - are the nose and the ear. These can be difficult to remove, necessitating long hours waiting in casualty, and so it is worth trying one or two of the following maneuvers.

The nose: The presence of a foreign body up the nose can give rise to the most unpleasant of fetid body odors. Dr. Michael Farnham, a pediatrician in Miami, describes a typical case: For a couple of months a two-year-old child had suf­fered from a body odor so unpleasant that the teacher at her nursery school insisted she be re­moved - even the child's mother could not stand to be near her. A thorough examination of the nose disclosed a piece of bathroom sponge with the same foul odor as that coming from the child. In an hour of its removal, the body odor had disap­peared.'

Dr. Eugene Guazzo, an American pediatrician has perfected a technique for removing unwanted objects from nostrils. His method is as follows: 'Place one's mouth over that of the child and blow gently until a degree of resistance is felt, then give one sharp exhalation, the object should pop out.' This should be carried out under medi­cal supervision as it may be unsuitable in some cases.

The ear: Foreign objects buried deep in the ear present more of a challenge. Dr. Mason Thompson from Georgia describes the following procedure which may be attempted if the object can be seen under a good light:

'I have removed small, hard objects, particularly the elusive sliding plastic bead, from the canal by using glue applied to a straightened paper clip. The procedure is accomplished by merely wet­ting the end of the paper clip with a small amount of rapidly drying glue; the object is visualized and the moistened tip of the paper clip is then placed against it. One waits a few seconds for drying and slowly withdraws the foreign body from the canal. The sliding hard object is more easily removed by this procedure whereas the embed­ded object may not be.'

Again, this should be attempted only under medical supervision.

The ear may also provide a comfortable home for small creatures that crawl into it at night and prove difficult to dislodge. This certainly does require a visit to the casualty department though the ques­tion of the best method of removal is offered here as one of the more diverting medical experiments of recent times. Numerous methods have been described for removing the common cockroach from the ear canal, the most popular of which appears to be placing mineral oil in the canal and the subsequent manual removal of the creature. More recently, the local anesthetic lignocaine spray has been suggested as a more effective ap­proach to the problem.

'Recently a patient presented with a cockroach in both ears and it was recognized immediately that fate had granted us the opportunity for an elegant comparative trial. We placed the time tested min­eral oil in one ear canal and the cockroach suc­cumbed after a valiant but futile struggle and its removal required much dexterity. In the opposite ear we sprayed 2 percent lignocaine solution. The response was immediate; the cockroach exited the canal at a convulsive speed and attempted to escape across the floor. A fleetfooted doctor promptly applied an equally time-tested remedy and killed the creature using the simple crush method.'

Dr. K. O'Toole from the University of Pittsburgh suggests this small experiment 'provides further evidence to justify the use of lignocaine for the treatment of the problem that has bugged man­kind throughout recorded history'.