Please let this never happen to me!

A patient came in complaining of left ear pain.  A common enough complaint.  I brought her to her room and decided I was going to take a peek inside her ear with the otoscope.  I was looking for ear wax so I could flush it out before the doc came in to see her.  The otoscope has a light and a magnifying glass to look through.  I placed it in her ear canal and what was looking back at me?  A HUGE cockroach!  Still alive, wiggling its antennae, and backing away from my light.  The woman was saying "Ow ow! Something's moving in there!"  I was shocked.  I looked right at her and told her about the cockroach.

Even worse, we couldn't get it out!  The PA was trying to pull it out with clamps but it kept backing further into the ear canal every time we put the light in.  She finally ended up pulling off the head but leaving the big ol' exoskeleton and guts.  We tried to flush it out with water but it didn't work.  We finally called the ear, nose, throat specialist and he told us that cockroaches are the hardest to remove from the ear because they have little pinchers on their legs that they dig into skin with.  She had to meet him at his office where he had specialty microscopic equipment to pull it out.  Poor lady!

For the rest of the day, every time my ear itched, I freaked out.