Story By: John Feng, Sub Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Asia Wire Report

A young girl suffered a ruptured spleen and lost over a pint of blood when her mum’s mobile phone struck her in the midriff after bouncing off their sofa.

Doctors at the People’s Hospital of Tongchuan City in north-western China’s Shaanxi Province were forced to remove the girl’s spleen in order to save her life.

The freak accident happened on 6th July as the 11-year-old was at home with her parents.

Pictures Credit: AsiaWire

Doctor Yang Shuanyuan explained: “Her mum threw her mobile phone onto the sofa, it bounced up and then hit the child in the midriff.

“The girl started feeling pain in her upper-left abdomen. Her spleen had ruptured, and she was bleeding internally.”

The girl’s parents thought the pain was superficial, and that it would go away, but they drove her to the hospital when she was still complaining of discomfort three hours later.

Doctor Yang ordered scans which revealed the seriousness of the child’s injury.

The medic said: “She suffered a tear and then a rupture. 

“She had 500 millilitres of blood in her abdominal cavity due to the 2-centimetre (0.8-inch) rupture in her spleen.

“500 millilitres is a lot for a child. Had we not discovered the internal bleeding in time, her life would’ve been at serious risk.”

After the girl’s parents gave their consent, Doctor Yang and his team performed a splenectomy to remove the damaged organ.

Yang said: “We’ve cut her spleen into slices and are cultivating it. We hope to restore at least partial spleen function for her in the future.

“At present, after careful treatment from our side, the child is in stable condition.”

The doctor explained that the severity of the child’s injury may have to do with her smaller-than-average size.

The girl weighs just 25 kilogrammes (4 stone, 55 pounds) and is 1.5 metres (4 feet 11 inches) tall, Yang said.

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