Doctors in China find unique strategy to break up gastric stone: Drink cola

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THE STAR – It is not often that somebody can claim a medical emergency was turned around by a can of cola, but this appears to be the case for a four-year-old girl in Shanghai.

Doctors discovered a goose egg-sized stone in her stomach after being admitted to hospital on February 15 because she was experiencing abdominal pain and was vomiting blood, according to ThePaper.cn.

It turned out the cause of the stone was six dried persimmons she ate on an empty stomach. The stone was causing numerous erosions in her stomach, leading to bleeding. The girl also had an ulcer that was about one centimetre in diameter.

The stone was over four centimetres in length and proved too large and hard to dislodge when doctors tried to remove the object with a stone basket, a long thin tool with a metal “net” on the end. The gastronomy staff was concerned that a significant surgery would exacerbate the child’s pain.

More details on Monday’s Borneo Bulletin