Abstract

Foreign body ingestion is stili a frequent occurence in the pediatric age group and a common encounter in the emergency department. A case of pencil ingestion is presented. A 13 year old girl after accidental ingestion of a sharp pointed pencil was admitted to our department. There were no symptoms related to ingestion of foreign object but hematemesis. Plain abdominal radiogram revealed radio-opacity belonging to the pencil at the level of stomach. At explorative laparotomy the pencil was palpated within the stomach and a Levin tube (No 16Fr) with its conic open end leading was inserted via orogastric route. Without performing gastrotomy the sharp pointed tip of the pencil was inserted into the lumen of the tube together with the pencil was withdrawn from mounth. The patient was discharged on the third postoperative day after an uneventful postperative course. The described technique is suggest as a good alternative to removal with gastrotomy since it reduces postoperative morbidity and length of hospital stay.