Over £3m Spent Removing Objects from Ears/Noses!
An interesting study labelled “Will Children Ever Learn?” was recently conducted, which analysed the number of patients attending hospital to have something removed from their ears or nose.
The study finds that between 2010 and 2016, 8,752 foreign bodies were found and removed from the noses of children and adults, whereas a whopping 17,325 foreign bodies were found and removed from the ears of children and adults!
The staggering amount of foreign bodies found in ears is over double that of nasal foreign bodies!
Why So Many?
The study recorded that 9 in every 10 patients who visited a hospital for the aforementioned reason, were children, which begs the question ‘Will they ever learn?’. In fact, 95% of aural foreign bodies, and 85% of nasal foreign bodies were removed from children. The study also reports that children between the ages of one and four are most likely to attend hospital to remove a foreign body in their nose, whereas children aged between five and nine years old are most likely to attend to remove a foreign body from their ears.
Significantly, the figures relating to GP practices were not recorded in the data, only cases which required hospital care.
What Do They Find?
Interestingly, the most common thing found lodged in the ears of children is actually jewellery. Small earrings and even cufflinks were found lodged in children’s ears. After jewellery, the next most common things found were pencils and plastic toys, remarkably.
Some GPs even reported finding ‘googly eyes’ and ‘polystyrene balls’
If you disregard children from the data set, the remaining adults who attended hospital to remove a foreign body from their ears, predominately suffered from excess cotton (from cotton buds), which left consistent amounts of cotton around the ear canal, and even up against the eardrum.
The Verdict
Recent NHS cut backs have really shone a light on this type of unnecessary spending. It’s never been more important to have an understanding of the dangers of inserting things into ears. Children will likely ‘never learn’, but the same cannot be said for the many adults who are admitted into A&E every month to remove foreign bodies. With the many awareness campaigns about the dangers of using cotton buds in your ears, there really is no excuse for an ear canal full of cotton, or worse, a bruised/perforated eardrum!
See our article on the Cotton Bud Ban here!
If you’ve got a build up of wax or a blockage in your ear canal, enquire today on our Wax Removal Page!
