July 2, 2002 Posted: 4:12 PM EDT (2012 GMT)



If the spear was just a few millimeters to the left or right, the young man may have died or suffered serious brain injury.




CRETE, GREECE (Reuters) -- The 20 year old student, whose family asked his name not be revealed, had gone spearfishing at Stavros beach near the northern town of Chania on the island of Crete. His friends realized after some hours that he had not returned and notified lifeguards in the area.

"He was floating upright with water up to his waist, and I reckon he was in this position for about six hours," said lifeguard Stelios Xenakis. "He was conscious and aware of his environment. He couldn't speak and was having trouble breathing."

Xenakis said the meter-long (40 inch) spear from the victim's fishing gun was embedded in his head, entering at his jaw and protruding from the top of his skull.

Neurosurgeons at Chania hospital set to work to remove the spear, and had to call in the help of the fire department to saw off a part of it so they could work around the patient.

After extensive X-rays and scans, the team of doctors needed three hours to remove the arrow, which had passed dangerously near extremely sensitive and important structures in his skull.

They said the most difficult point of the operation was the extraction, due to fears of blood vessels bursting and causing internal bleeding in the brain.

"It passed through many extremely dangerous regions which posed a serious risk to his life," said neurosurgeon Michalis Papadakakis. "Finally, after much precaution, we managed to remove the foreign object without damaging or destroying any of these regions and without creating any problems in the area."

Konstantine Bakopoulos, another member of the surgical team, said the youth's life was saved by just millimeters.

If the spear was just millimeters left or right he may have died or suffered serious brain injury, but it passed through one of the spaces in the brain that are non-functional.

Bakopoulos said the youth has no health problems whatsoever and does not have to be monitored as there is no future risk. He said the young man was back home and walking and talking normally.

Odd, but there's no Prince-related anything.. To fix that, how about worrying that Prince should protect his hearing from spiders?

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http://www.sky.com/skynew...59,00.html

(with picture)

Spider In Woman's Ear


A woman went to her doctor complaining of headaches - and was told there was a spider living her ear.

The arachnid had even spun a web in the woman's ear canal during its brief stay.

The 33-year-old, from Athens, felt a sharp pain in her ear while out riding a motorbike.

Perfect temperature

She went to her doctor who after a brief examination broke the astonishing news, Greek television station Private Star reported.

Dr Evangelos Gollas said: "When I examined the patient, I was surprised to find a spider's web and then, I saw there was movement.

"The spider found itself in her ear, and because the temperature is ideal there, it stayed."

The woman did not need to surgery to remove the spider and was not injured.

Ohhh GROSS!! GROSS!!


I wish the GD section was back...I had to post my Odd series here because of Matt's threat to block out non-prince related on the music section...WA WA WA!!!





Can I say gross one more time? Spider!! Ear!! GROSS!!!

SkletonKee said:

I thought I wasn't gonna be able to read past that part. This type of thing ... ummm, upsets me. I was watching tv once a few years ago and on some show there was this duck (close your eyes Randomduck) that had a spear through the middle of its body (in its belly), but the duck acted fine, and there was no blood that you could see at the entrance of both sides of the spear. A vet cut one side of the spear and pulled it through the other. It would have bothered me if I didn't see them get the spear out of it.

Somebody hold me. I need comfort.

Aerogram said:

I'm afraid to look...lol...