A woman who complained of eight months of abdominal pain following an operation was shocked to discover that a 12-centimetre-long pair of scissors had been left inside her after she was sewn back up by bungling medics.
Sadiye Boyun, 54, had gone for the surgery at a private clinic in the Turkish capital Ankara after she was diagnosed with a gynaecological disease.
But after the pain refused to subside, she went back for a checkup, and an x-ray revealed that the scissors had been left inside her.
The woman told local media that when she went for the x-ray, the technician had asked her to remove the scissors from her pocket. When she revealed that she didn’t have any scissors, the astonished technician and then discovered that they had been left inside her.
They had apparently been forgotten after an operation and had to be surgically removed. As a result of her suffering, which involved several follow-up operations, the woman has now filed a criminal complaint.
She said that when the pain became too unbearable, she was taken to hospital by ambulance where the x-rays revealed the 12-centimetre- (4.7-inch-) long pair of scissors.
She said she decided to take legal action after the hospital had not even apologised for the incident.
The doctor involved said that it was the responsibility of the nurses to count the number of implements to make sure nothing was left inside the patient.
The fact that this was not done was not the fault of the doctor, he claimed.
