Chopstick Lodged Into Toddler's Brain After He Trips and Falls Into It

A toddler in China is lucky to be alive after a chopstick got lodged into his brain.

On Sunday, Feb. 18, the toddler, who has only been identified by his nickname Yang Yang, was running around his home in Hengyang, Hunan Province with a chopstick in his hands as his grandmother followed him as she tried to feed him, the Daily Mail reports. As the toddler, who isn't even two-years-old, ran over a threshold, however, he tripped and fell, the chopstick impaling the boy through his mouth.

The toddler was rushed to a nearby hospital before being transported to Central South University's Second Xiangya Hospital in the provincial capital Changsha, where doctors discovered that the chopstick had gone so deep into the boy's skull that it was lodged into his brain.

The toddler was rushed into emergency surgery, where a team of experts carefully worked to remove the chopstick. Neurosurgeons Huang Wei, Xiang Jun and chief of neuro Zhou Yangpo operated on the child, having to open the boy's skull from the back of his head in order to remove the object.

The operation, which began in the evening and lasted until the early hours of the morning, was successful. The toddler has since regained consciousness and is in the ICU. He is expected to return home within the coming days.

This isn't the first time that a food-related utensil has ended in a trip to the hospital. In June, Chester Poole, 63, of Nova Scotia, had been making hamburgers on his grill when he suddenly felt something poke the back of his throat. Poole spent five hours in outpatient care, x-rays confirmed that a stray wire from his grill brush was lodged in his throat. His doctor was able to extract the wire, although Poole learned he was lucky the procedure was a success after his doctor told him that they are oftentimes unable to remove grill brush needles.