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By:

Quaid Najmi

4 January 2025 at 3:26:24 pm

Surgery saves boy who gulped tiny LED bulb

Mumbai : In a bizarre development, a small boy from Kolhapur swallowed a tiny LED light bulb a few months ago that got stuck deep in his...

Surgery saves boy who gulped tiny LED bulb

Mumbai : In a bizarre development, a small boy from Kolhapur swallowed a tiny LED light bulb a few months ago that got stuck deep in his lung causing huge trauma and emotional stress for his family, officials said.   When the unusual case was referred to the Jaslok Hospital & Research Centre (JHRC), a team of medicos successfully extricated the foreign object lodged in the three-and-half-year-old boy’s chest.   Recounting the remarkable feat, a JHRC official said the child, Aarav Patil was reported to be suffering from severe breathing difficulties and incessant coughing for almost three months.   Doctors treating him at his home town initially mistook it for pneumonia and subjected him to multiple courses of antibiotics and other medicines, but there was improvement in the boy’s condition.   Subsequently, he was taken for advanced tests, examinations and a CT Scan which revealed the shocker – a metallic object was sitting inside the boy’s left bronchus, partially blocking the airway.   More tests identified the offending object – it was a LED bulb from a toy car – a development so rare that even seasoned doctors described it as a ‘one in a million case’.   Though doctors in Kolhapur attempted to retrieve the foreign body through flexible bronchoscopy - a minimally invasive procedure - the attempts proved to be unsuccessful.   As Aarav’s condition appeared to deteriorate, his desperate family rushed him to JHRC and he was referred to a team of specialist doctors.   After studying his case and examining Aarav, the medical team comprising thoracic surgeon Dr. Vimesh Rajput, ENT surgeon Dr. Divya Prabhat and Dr. Anurag Jain discovered that the bulb had not only blocked the bronchus but had also embedded itself in the surrounding tissues of the lung tissue, making its removal extremely challenging.   A rigid bronchoscopy conducted further confirmed the severity of the obstruction. Left with no other option, the doctors decided to opt for a mini thoracotomy — a delicate surgery involving a 4-centimeter incision in the chest.   “This was one of the rarest cases we’ve encountered. The bulb was lodged in such a way that conventional methods could not retrieve it. Through careful planning and teamwork, we managed to safely remove the object by a mini thoracotomy and restored Aarav’s lung function,” explained Dr. Rajput.   Emphasising how such cases are ignored, Dr. Prabhat pointed out that chronic cough or breathing issues are often dismissed as common pneumonia or even asthma.   “However, such persistent symptoms must always be investigated thoroughly, especially through early detection and imaging which can make all the difference to the patient,” she averred.   JHRC CMO Dr. Milind Khadke said, “The foreign body aspiration in kids is far more common that parents may realise but quick intervention is critical to prevent long-term medical complications.”

The Saffron Warriors

Updated: Oct 22, 2024

Saffron Warriors

When Uddhav Thackeray took oath as the 18th chief minister of Maharashtra on November 28, 2019, he proclaimed that he had fulfilled his late father’s wish to have a ‘Shiv Sainik’ seated in the highest executive office in the Government of Maharashtra. It surprised many to see members of the Thackeray family taking up a constitutional post as Uddhav’s son, Aditya, followed him into the council of ministers. For over four decades since he founded the Shiv Sena as a political party, Bal Thackeray never aimed to hold any office. He had proudly claimed he that was the “remote control” that controlled the actions of the chief minister when the Shiv Sena and BJP had formed the government between 1995 and 1999. The Thackeray dynasty, until 2019, was seen as the force behind the scenes, one that had full authority but no answerability.


Bal Thackeray, one among the eight children of writer and social reformer Prabhodhankar or Keshav Thackeray, founded the Shiv Sena on June 19, 1966. He had started his career as a cartoonist in the Free Press Journal and later went on to publish Marmik, a weekly in Marathi. A cartoonist par excellence and journalist, Thackeray used his weekly to comment on social and political issues and started his career in public life by leading a movement against migrants and fighting for the rights of the sons-of-the-soil. Therein lay the birth of the Shiv Sena, a party that later went on to scale great heights and reach the chambers of power in the Centre and in the state.


Thackeray anointed Uddhav as his heir in January 2003 at the party’s conclave. He took over as the ‘pakshapramukh’ and after Raj’s departure from the party, Sena workers rallied around Uddhav. In 2010, Thackeray launched his grandson Aaditya at a grand party event and handed over the reins of the Yuva Sena or the youth wing of the party to him.


 The father-son duo kept their flock together in elections even after the death of the senior Thackeray in 2012, winning the cash-rich Mumbai municipal corporation and state elections with the BJP. In 2019, in a surprise turn of events, Uddhav was named Chief Minister of Maharashtra as part of a post-poll alliance with the Congress and Nationalist Congress Party.


 His party split when senior leader Eknath Shinde walked away with legislators in 2022.

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