DOCTORS and nurses really do see it all - as some of this year's strangest medical cases certainly prove.

There was a man who coughed up a blood clot in the exact shape of a lung, a man who lived with a spoon in his oesophagus for a year and a woman who had a parasitic worm wriggling around her face.

Then there are just the plain bizarre cases that involved sex toys, shower heads and all manner of things you wouldn't want happening down there.

So as the year draws to a close let's look back at some of the weirdest case reports from 2018...

1. The man who coughed up a lung

A man who went into hospital with heart problems ended up literally coughing up a lung.

The 36-year-old was admitted to University of California San Francisco Medical Center with heart failure.

The patient had a pacemaker fitted due to a history of poor cardiovascular health, according to the New England Journal of Medicine.

During his first week of treatment he began coughing violently, according to reports.

During such a coughing fit he hawked up blood clot in the shape of a bronchial tree - a series of tubes that distribute air to the lungs.

The unnamed patient died a week later.

2. The man with a spoon in his throat for a year

This picture has to be seen to be believed, but a man lived with a spoon in his oesophagus for a year.

The man, from China, swallowed the spoon on a dare, according to Live Science.

It got stuck in his oesophagus but didn't cause him any pain, so he left it.

It wasn't until he was punched in the chest a year later than he began experiencing chest pains and trouble breathing as the spoon had moved.

It took doctors at Xinjiang Meikuang General Hospital two hours to remove the spoon.

3. The woman with a parasitic worm wriggling around her face

A bizarre lump that appeared on a woman's face was actually a parasitic worm crawling under her skin.

The Russian woman first noticed the lump under her left eye but in a few days it had moved.

The woman tracked the small lump taking selfies every time it moved.

Her first picture shows it just below her left eye, but five days later the worm had crawled to above her eye.

Ten days after the first noticed it the worm had crawled all the way down into her lip, causing it to swell up.

The 32-year-old then went to see an eye doctor who noticed the lump was moving around the upper left eyelid, according to the report in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Tests confirmed the woman was infected with a parasitic worm that naturally infects dogs, cats, foxes and other wild mammals and it was surgically removed.

4. The man who 'caught mad cow disease' after eating squirrel brains

A man died after catching a rare form of mad cow disease from eating squirrel brains.

The 61-year-old experienced cognitive decline and lost touch with reality before he was brought to hospital in 2015, according to a new report on his case.

Scans of his head revealed Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), a fatal brain condition caused by infectious proteins called prions.

The hunting fan, from New York, reportedly ate squirrel brains, which could have triggered the condition.

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Originally Posted by starrdust

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