Jelly Ball Removed

Specialists at Schneider Children’s extracted an enlarged jelly ball from the colon of a one-year-old child after he was brought to the ER suffering from a distended abdomen, vomiting and feeling ill. An ultrasound performed by senior radiologist, Dr. Yaniv Lakovsky, showed a ball blocking the duodenum.

Following consultation with senior surgeons Dr. Arthur Baazov and Dr. Adriana Nika, the infant was rushed to the operating theater where it was decided to remove the blockage through gastroscopy. The surgeons discovered that the blockage was in fact a jelly ball that the child had swallowed. The ball had become swollen in the bowel and caused the blockage that endangered his life. The gastroscopy was conducted by Dr. Orit Weisbord-Zinman, senior physician in the Institute of Gastroscopy, Nutrition and Liver Diseases headed by Prof. Raanan Shamir, and annesthetists, Dr. Aviv Tutenauer and Dr. Konstantin Nakarsov. The child was subsequently hospitalized in the Pediatrics B Department headed by Prof. Daniel Landau, for observation and follow-up.

About 5 months ago, a one-year-old arrived in the ER after swallowing similar jelly balls. Luckily, this incident concluded without any complications.

Dr. Weisbord-Zinman noted that “we see a growing number of cases where infants and children have swallowed these jelly balls. This game can turn dangerous with a potential for great injury if these are swallowed by infants. They expand inside the body, represent a real threat to life. We caution parents again to pay attention and ensure that their children do not play with these small items. Parents must move them out of the reach of toddlers, since severe injury can result if they are swallowed.”