CT images have shown how a long, steel rod skewered a Chinese woman who fell from a 3-meter platform and nearly died. The images and story were reported in a 2 September story from the Daily Telegraph in Australia.
The woman, known only as Xiang, was working at a construction site in Guangdong province when she accidentally fell from the platform and landed on an 80-cm pole. The rod entered her body at her buttocks, traveled all the way through her abdomen, and poked out from her right shoulder.
Xiang's coworkers cut the pole so that she could be transported to Guangdong Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine. CT scans taken at the hospital showed the rod narrowly missing the woman's vital organs and major blood vessels.
Doctors performed an emergency three-hour surgery to remove the pole and stop the bleeding. The woman is now in stable condition and recovering at the hospital, according to the Daily Telegraph.
