A Fishy Doctor's Visit

by Matt S
(Norfolk, Virginia)

One of the most memorable health incidents I have ever experienced involved a fish bone and a quick-thinking doctor.

I was visiting a friend in the Chesapeake Bay area who was a very serious fisherman. During my stay, he would usually cook fish that he had caught for dinner. On the second day of my five day visit, he reeled in a beauty of a trout and brought it home to char-broil it in his huge kitchen. We sat down to this great meal with a couple of our other buddies.

Well, about a half hour after the dinner was over, I get this scratchy feeling in my throat. I have very bad allergies, so I was worried that it was the first stage of a reaction to something. So, just to be safe, I went to a local doctor.

I walked into his office and told him about the scratchy feeling and the trout I'd had for dinner. He said that I might have a bone in my throat, but thought that this was unlikely, as he had been a doctor in the Chesapeake area for twenty years and had never seen a fish bone caught in someone's throat. He took a light, checked out my throat, and gasped. "There is a bone! And it's huge!" he exclaimed.

He explained that the standard procedure was to have a small operation done, but that he could speed up the process by just reaching in and yanking the bone out. I'm pretty insensitive to pain, so I opted for the yank out option.

He reached in, I felt a few stings, and he pulled out a giant bone.(over an inch and a half long) It was the first and only time, in over forty years of eating fish, that I have gotten a bone in my throat- and it was quite a bone ...and no allergic reaction!