Outlook

• The vast majority of people with a foreign object in their rectum will have more injury to their pride than anything else and will suffer no long-term complications or problems.

• A small number of people will have significant injury. This is seen particularly in cases where the diagnosis is difficult—in the very young and psychiatric patients—or where the person has delayed seeking treatment. Complications may also be present when a violent sexual assault has occurred. These people may develop significant and severe abdominal injury and infection.

• As a result, they may require a colostomy (where the bowel is brought up to the skin surface and the stool is passed into a bag). Or they may require a long stay in the hospital and antibiotics.

• In very rare cases, the injury may be so severe that the person dies of the complications.