Videos of people performing various simple treatments and procedures on their skin have become overwhelmingly popular on social media, with many of the clips racking up hundreds of thousands — sometimes even millions — of views.

There are even entire YouTube channels dedicated to this, and people seem genuinely interested in watching clips of someone poking, pulling, or popping the skin.

One such clip has gone viral after showing the removal of a three-year-old stitch out of the leg of one man, left inside by doctors who performed surgery.

Namely, back in 2013, a man from Memphis, Tennessee experienced a serious accident that required him to receive over 100 stitches in one of his legs. Most sutures are responsibly removed after several days or several weeks, but this time, things got a bit more complex.

The Encyclopedia of Surgery states that stitches and staples are two methods for closing a wound. Stitches are specialized needles and thread to ‘sew’ a wound closed, and are the most common means used in the case of a substantial wound or cut longer than a half-inch or 12 millimeters long.

Nonabsorbable sutures are ideal for skin wounds because they are more likely to have a cosmetically appealing result. In the case of skin wounds, they are removed once the wound has healed.

Moreover, it is said that non-absorbable stitches should be removed several days to weeks after their placement, depending on their location. Therefore, sutures on the face should be removed in about 5 days, the ones on the back in 10-14 days, and sutures in the legs and abdomen in 7 to 10 days.

While the idea of stitches left inside the body is medically unheard of, accidents can always happen. In the case of this man from Memphis, this is exactly what happened! Namely, some of his stitches remained inside his leg for three full years.

One spot of his leg continually itched, and sometimes, the itchiness was so intense that he ended up breaking through skin and drawing blood from scratching so hard.

One day, he noticed something strange while scratching his leg. He saw a small, plastic black wire poking out of his leg. He started pulling it, and eventually removed an intact stitch!

He actually found eight of them in his leg, and recorded a video of the removal of one. Since uploading it in 2016, the video has garnered over 14 million views.

Watch it below, but remember to not try this at home!

It is best for a person to have a healthcare professional remove their stitches, as a doctor or a nurse can ensure the safe removal of the stitches to minimize the risk of infection.

Sources:
taphaps.com
www.drugs.com
www.medicalnewstoday.com