Bhubaneswar: A four-year-old girl, who accidentally inhaled a tiny LED bulb while eating rice crackers, underwent a successful minimally invasive procedure at Kalinga Institute of Medical Sciences (KIMS), Bhubaneswar, to remove the object from her right lung.A team of doctors, led by Dr Pradipt Ranjan Sahoo, professor of ENT and head-neck surgery, and Dr Manisha Mallick, assistant professor in the same department, successfully removed the small metallic LED bulb lodged deep inside the right lung of the girl using a hybrid bronchoscopy technique on July 16, avoiding open surgery. The team also included Dr Basant Kumar Behera from the department of anaesthesiology and Dr Swadip Mishra from respiratory medicine.The child was brought to KIMS with a persistent cough on July 15, eight days after she accidentally inhaled the LED bulb.According to the girl’s mother, the incident occurred on July 8 while the child was eating rice crackers from a snack packet. “She suddenly started coughing continuously. After I gave her some water, she told me she had accidentally inhaled a small LED bulb that was inside the packet,” the mother said, requesting anonymity.The family initially consulted a local doctor who prescribed some medicines for the child, but when her coughing persisted, she underwent an X-ray, which revealed that the LED bulb had lodged near her chest. The parents then took the child to Sishu Bhawan in Cuttack on July 13. Doctors attempted to remove the foreign body through conventional bronchoscopy, but the procedure was unsuccessful as the bulb had travelled deep into the lower part of her right lung. She was subsequently referred to SCB Medical College and Hospital, but the family instead shifted her to KIMS on July 15.A CT scan at KIMS confirmed that the LED bulb was lodged in a narrow branch of the lower lobe of the right lung, making retrieval particularly challenging.Instead of resorting to open surgery, the medical team adopted a combined rigid and flexible bronchoscopy approach. While the rigid bronchoscope helped keep the airway open and stable, the flexible one enabled doctors to precisely locate and manoeuvre around the object before safely extracting it.The child recovered without complications, was able to resume eating within a few hours of the procedure and was discharged in a stable condition on July 20, the hospital said.Doctors said inhalation of foreign objects such as button batteries, beads, toy parts and small bulbs is a common emergency among young children and can become life-threatening if the object gets lodged deep inside the airway. Such cases often require complex procedures and, in some instances, open surgery.The KIMS said the successful use of the hybrid bronchoscopy technique in this case demonstrates how minimally invasive methods can effectively manage difficult paediatric airway emergencies while reducing surgical trauma and recovery time.Achyuta Samanta, founder of KIIT, KISS and KIMS, congratulated the medical team and wished the child a speedy recovery.
