Medical anomalies have long fascinated both doctors and the general public, but few cases are as visually stunning as this one. In 2018, a 36-year-old man, suffering from severe heart failure, managed to cough up a blood clot in the exact shape of his right bronchial tree.
This bizarre event left medical professionals in awe and has since been showcased in The New England Journal of Medicine’s photo series of extraordinary medical conditions.
How the Blood Clot Formed
Dr. Georg Wieselthaler, a transplant and pulmonary surgeon at the University of California, San Francisco, treated the patient, who was in the intensive care unit with end-stage heart failure.
To help his heart pump blood more efficiently, the patient was connected to a ventricular-assist device. But this life-saving device comes with certain risks, one of which is the increased likelihood of blood clot formation due to the turbulence in the pump. To mitigate this, patients are often prescribed blood thinners, but these can sometimes cause issues with clotting in the lungs.