A 26-year-old woman from Cameroon has had a condom surgically removed from her appendix, after swallowing it while performing oral sex on her boyfriend two weeks earlier.
The unusual case, described in the Journal of Medical Case Reports, has received a great deal of interest around the world.
According to report author Doctor Carlson B. Sama, from the surgery department at Cameroon's University of Buea, the woman came into the clinic complaining of pain and tenderness in her lower abdomen.
As reported in the journal, the pain had been increasing for a few days and conventional painkillers had had no effect. Suspecting appendicitis, the doctors conducted an ultrasound scan which revealed a swollen appendix and fluid build-up.
An emergency surgery began, and surgeons successfully removed the appendix with no complications.
However, doctors said the organ felt unusual, and after dissecting it to find out more, they were surprised to find pieces of a condom.
Although doctors didn't believe she had eaten any foreign bodies before the operation, she revealed after the procedure that she remembered accidentally swallowing the condom while performing oral sex on her boyfriend two weeks before.
She didn't mention this to the doctors, because she said she passed out parts of the condom around five days after swallowing it.
The doctors believe the condom was torn into pieces as it passed through her intestines, where small pieces of it became trapped in the appendix, at the end of her large intestine.
Apart from the strange find, her surgery was successful, and she was discharged from hospital four days after the operation.
Although her case is rare, appendicitis caused by the ingestion of foreign materials has occurred before.
As the doctors write in their report, swallowed objects like bullets, coins, stones and toothbrush bristles have all been reported to cause appendicitis in past medical literature.
While foreign bodies can remain in the appendix for years without causing too many problems, the woman was lucky to get hers removed quickly.
