‘Stone-child’ stays inside of 91-year-old Chilean woman for over 60 years

A 91-year-old woman was found to carry a calcified foetus outside her womb. The Chilean woman said she was unable to have children for 74 years with her late husband, until doctors discovered the bump on her belly was a foetus for over six decades, until Wednesday, Aug 5.

The woman, Estela Meléndez, said she was first told that the bump in her belly was a tumour and was needed to be operated, but after her second X-ray to confirm the finding, the doctors were surprised with what they have discovered, she told CNN. The bump is a two-kilogramme or 4.4-pound foetus filling her abdominal cavity.

The doctors who performed the routine X-rays said the calcified foetus may have died during pregnancy, but Meléndez stated she had no idea that she was carrying a foetus or even got pregnant. The foetus, inside the Chilean woman’s abdomen and outside her uterus for 60 years, was found when until she was brought into the hospital after a fall, which was when the doctors recognised the unusual mass on her X-ray.

According to Margo Vargas Lazo, director of the hospital where Meléndez was treated, the condition that caused concern to her is called "lithopaedion" or stone-child, when a foetus dies and calcifies outside of the womb. Doctors considering the age of the elderly patient, defined the discovery as "extraordinarily rare," Lazo told Efes news agency in Chile.

The doctors at the local clinic will not perform a surgery to remove the foetus as operating a 91-year-old patient is a riskier case than her condition. However, Meléndez said the bump hurts sometimes, but according to experts, the calcified foetus is not a risk to her life.

But the bump in her belly, Meléndez said, is one of her few regrets, because after living with her husband for 74 years before he died at the age of 91, they were unable to have children. She stated the bump reminds her of her husband and their unfulfilled dream of having a child, and added they have "suffered tremendously” because of that.

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