CMCH doctors remove peanut aspirated by toddler

The toddler was first rushed to a private hospital in Tiruppur where doctors found that the peanut was lodged in his left main bronchus.

The boy with his mother and doctors at the Coimbatore Medical College Hospital after the procedure.

Doctors at the Coimbatore Medical College Hospital (CMCH) recently removed from the airway of a two-year-old boy a peanut that he had aspirated at his house in Tiruppur.

The toddler was first rushed to a private hospital in Tiruppur where doctors found that the peanut was lodged in his left main bronchus. As attempts to remove it failed, the private hospital referred the child to the CMCH on Tuesday evening.

A team comprising A.R. Ali Sultan, Head of the Department of ENT, associate professor V. Saravanan and assistant professor M. Nallasivam from the department, and Professor Kalyanasundaram, assistant professors Madana Gopal and Anita from the Department of Anaesthesiology removed the peanut through rigid bronchoscopy under general anaesthesia on Wednesday morning.

CMCH Dean A. Nirmala lauded the team for the timely intervention which saved the boy from a life threatening condition.

According to Dr. Sultan, peanut is the most common thing aspirated by children and it normally gets stuck in the left main bronchus unlike in adults (right main bronchus). Complete obstruction of the airway will affect inflation and deflation of the lung.

“If the obstructing foreign object is not removed within 24 to 48 hours, the affected lobe (left or right) of the lung becomes solid and non-functional. If children who are otherwise normal suffer from sudden cough and breathlessness without a fever, aspiration has to be suspected. Partial obstruction by aspirating small particles can also happen which leads to intermittent breathlessness and cough,” Dr. Sultan said. A qualified doctor should be consulted at the earliest , he said.