Bizarre it may sound, but a team of doctors at Hanagal Shree Kumareshwar Hospital and Research Centre in Bagalkot in Karnataka has reportedly removed as many as 187 coins from the stomach of a 58-year-old patient.
The patient, identified as Dyamappa Harijan, from Raichur district, was reportedly suffering from schizophrenia and cultivated the habit of swallowing coins.
He was rushed to Hangal Sri Kumareshwar Hospital after he complained of vomiting and abdominal discomfort. The doctors carried out an X-ray to ascertain the source of discomfort and found the coins nestled in the stomach. Subsequently, the doctors performed an endoscopy and removed the coins weighing 1.5kg.
As per reports, the patient had swallowed 56 five-rupee coins, 51 two-rupee coins and 80 one-rupee coins over a period of several months.
What is Schizophrenia?
As per medical term, schizophrenia is a chronic, severe mental disorder that affects the way a person thinks, acts, expresses emotions, and perceives reality.
As per World Health Organisation (WHO), schizophrenia causes psychosis and is associated with considerable disability and may affect all areas of life including personal, family, social, educational, and occupational functioning.
Schizophrenia affects approximately 24 million people or 1 in 300 people (0.32%) worldwide. This rate is 1 in 222 people (0.45%) among adults (2).
This is not the first time that coins were removed from the stomach of patient. Earlier in 2019, doctors at the Rampurhat. Government Medical College and Hospital had removed a lump of coins, necklaces, anklets, rings, earrings and watches weighing 1.5kg from the stomach of woman.
Similarly in August this year, doctors at MDM Hospital in Jodhpur of Rajasthan had removed 63 coins from the stomach of a man through a two-day-long endoscopic procedure.
In 2017, doctors in Maharashtra surgically removed 72 coins from the stomach of a man who had swallowed them over a long period due to mental illness.