Skeleton of dead baby removed from a woman’s body after 36 years

A team of doctors in Nagpur, India, have removed a mass of a child’s skeleton from a 60 year old woman’s body after she unknowingly carried it for 36 years.

The woman’s problem started in 1978 when she was 24 years old. Then pregnant, doctors told her she was suffering an ectopic pregnancy, a situation whereby the foetus grew outside the womb. The doctors suggested surgery to remove the irregular pregnancy but the woman, Kantabai Thakre, was afraid of going under the knife so she sought local treatment at a health centre in her village. After a few months, the pain left her and she was convinced she had been treated.

But 36 years later, Thakre, now 60, started experiencing constant pain in her stomach which forced her to visit NKP Salve Institute of Medical Sciences, in the central Indian city of Nagpur. There, doctors detected a lump on her right side.

Speaking to DailyMail Uk, head of surgery in the hospital, Dr Murtaza Akhtar, said they initially feared it was a cancer but “after she went through an MRI and CT scan we could make out that it was actually a matured skeleton encapsulated in a calcified sac.

“When we asked her for her medical history she told us that she was pregnant in 1978 but her child had died”

The mass was found densely sandwiched between her uterus, intestines and bladder.

Another doctor who was part of the surgical team explained that “the amniotic fluid that protects the foetus might have been absorbed and the soft tissues liquefied over time with only a bag of bones with some fluid remaining”.

He said the mass compressed the urinary system, compromising the functioning of the kidneys which led to the pains, fever and urinary problems that Thakre started experiencing.

After the historical and rare surgical procedure, the dead baby’s skeleton was removed.
If that baby were to be alive today, he would be 35 or 36 years old.