Santiago, August 8: In a shocking incident, doctors in Chile found a foetus in the uterus of a 91year-old woman.
The nonagenarian Estela Meléndez residing in La Boca, a town located where the Rapel River meets the Pacific Ocean in the municipality of Navidad, never realized she got pregnant, reported CNN.
She has had a lump on her belly for many years, but had no idea that she was carrying a foetus. Doctors say it has been in her uterus for over six decades. The foetus is calcified and poses no health risk to the woman.
It was not until she recently suffered a fall that doctors spotted something on her X-ray that caused concern.
“The doctor said I had a tumor and that they needed to operate on me,” said Meléndez.
But when a second X-ray was ordered to confirm, doctors couldn’t believe their eyes. The mass they were looking at turned out not to be a tumour, but a foetus.
“I have the lump here,” Meléndez says, touching her belly.
“Can you imagine? More than 60 years!” said Luis Meléndez, the woman’s nephew. “I wonder how she never felt bad once the foetus died inside of her.”
On a deeper level, she says, the lump on her belly reminds her of her husband and their unfulfilled dream of having a child all those years ago.
