By Tim Binnall
A man in China got quite the surprise when he went to the hospital seeking treatment for chronic headaches and doctors discovered that the condition was caused by a bullet that had been lodged in his skull for twenty years. The jaw-dropping case reportedly came to light last week when the patient, identified by the pseudonym 'Xiao Chen,' grew concerned after the headaches that he had experienced throughout his life had suddenly become more frequent and increasingly painful. Initially suspecting that he merely needed to get more sleep, the man soon found that this was not the answer as the problem only got worse.
At his wit's end over the chronic condition, Chen sought help at the Shenzhen University General Hospital, where doctors were stunned by what they found upon examining his head. Performing an MRI on the patient, the astounded technicians spotted a bullet that had somehow gotten stuck in his skull. Amazingly, the object was a mere two centimeters from the man's temple and could have easily killed him had it not been stopped by the bone. Understandably perplexed by how he wound up with the bullet in his head, doctors asked the man how this could have been possible and he offered a response that made his call of the more bizarre.
Recalling an incident from twenty years ago, the man said he and his brother had been playing with an air gun when it accidentally fired and a bullet struck his head. Since, at the time, the mishap did not appear injure him and the boys feared that they would get in trouble with their parents, they kept the seemingly innocuous accident a secret. An unknowing Chen subsequently grew up with the projectile in his skull until the doctors finally removed the object last week and, presumably, put an end to his chronic headaches.