Woman's forgotten stent turns into stone inside liver

How the calcified stent was removed

- Rupsa Chakraborty

MUMBAI: In an extremely rare and medically complex case, a 72-year-old woman was found to have a biliary stent inside her liver that had calcified into a stone-like structure after being left in her body for over a decade. The forgotten stent, which had severely migrated and become encased in bile and calcium, posed a major removal challenge—one stent was successfully broken and extracted, while the other had to be pushed into the intestine.

A biliary stent is a small tube inserted into the bile duct to keep it open and ensure proper drainage of bile from the liver to the intestine, typically used to relieve blockages by stones, tumors or inflammation.

Nalini Devidas Sawaskar, a resident of Dombivli, began experiencing persistent abdominal pain and vomiting late last year. Initially believed to be gastrointestinal distress, imaging at Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital in Navi Mumbai revealed two plastic stents in her bile duct, over 10 years old, one of which had calcified and lodged deep in her liver.