# Most radical auto invasive surgery anyone has performed? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [April 28, 2005, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530 "2005-04-28T12:18:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Uncommon\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Uncommon\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncommon_Sense)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/1 "2005-04-28T12:18:42Z")
What’s the most radical surgical procedure anyone has ever performed on themselves? I’ve heard stories about folks amutating limbs, doing major dental work, large scale body peircings, etc. Has enyone ever performed invasive internal surgery on themselves? Like removing a spleen, kidney, cyst, or maybe even an auto-tracheotomy. ---
**Author:** ![Rune](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e68b1a/32.png) [@Rune](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rune)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 12:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/2 "2005-04-28T12:27:51Z")
Apparently some guys have been trepanning themselves. [http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/320/7235/602/c](http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/320/7235/602/c) I also read of a guy who cut off his own penis, becuase he was upset about his wife or something… ---
**Author:** ![brossa](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/brossa/32/3040_2.png) [@brossa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brossa)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/3 "2005-04-28T14:19:34Z")
Trepanning? Penis amputation? Pussies… [Attempted adrenalectomy](http://www.micebreed.de/div/GenitalAndAbdominalSelfSurgery.html) ---
**Author:** ![Finagle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b19c9b/32.png) [@Finagle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Finagle)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/4 "2005-04-28T14:22:06Z")
A few years back, there was a story of a woman who performed a Caesarian section on herself ([http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4677630/](http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4677630/)). That’s pretty hardcore. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/5 "2005-04-28T14:55:21Z")
You may remember Dr. Jerri Nielsen, a doctor at the research station at the South Pole who treated her own breast cancer (chemotherapy and biopsies, but no self-administered lumpectomy). In an article describing her case, I found a brief mention that a Soviet doctor removed his own appendix in Antartica in 1961. ---
**Author:** ![Uncommon\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Uncommon\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncommon_Sense)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/6 "2005-04-28T14:57:11Z")
> [@brossa](#): > > Trepanning? Penis amputation? Pussies… > > [Attempted adrenalectomy](http://www.micebreed.de/div/GenitalAndAbdominalSelfSurgery.html) Yes, that’s the sort of stuff I’m looking for. Any successful operations? ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/7 "2005-04-28T15:26:56Z")
> [@brossa](#): > > Trepanning? Penis amputation? Pussies… > > [Attempted adrenalectomy](http://www.micebreed.de/div/GenitalAndAbdominalSelfSurgery.html) :eek: Sweet Jesus. Not only that, but the man had been previously successful in removing his own testicles. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/8 "2005-04-28T15:45:04Z")
In [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=165383), I inquired about a guy who replaced his own teeth. No cites turned up though. ---
**Author:** ![vetbridge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b5e925/32.png) [@vetbridge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vetbridge)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/9 "2005-04-28T15:58:31Z")
> [@brossa](#): > > Trepanning? Penis amputation? Pussies… > > [Attempted adrenalectomy](http://www.micebreed.de/div/GenitalAndAbdominalSelfSurgery.html) Wow. Adrenalectomy done on an anesthetized patient is not an easy task. Wow. ---
**Author:** ![Uncommon\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Uncommon\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncommon_Sense)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/10 "2005-04-28T16:17:41Z")
**Finagle, Dewey Finn** , sweet Jesus, that is some hardcore stuff. An appendix? That’s gotta be tough. How do you anesthetize and still maintain awareness? And the caesarian had to be very bloody. Yikes. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/11 "2005-04-28T16:45:02Z")
I couldn’t find anything more about the Soviet doctor who performed his own appendectomy, but Dr Nielsen’s case was more recent, and well-documented on the internet. Of course both of these cases took place in Antartica where the isolation is almost unique on earth. Slightly related is one of the obituaries from this week’s Time Magazine, of a USN lieutenant commander/pharmacist’s mate who performed an emergency appendectomy on a shipmate after only having witnessed one such procedure as a lab tech. Of course, this was on board a WWII submarine that was a week from port. So again, extreme isolation is a big factor here. And I just remembered the guy in Utah, I believe, who became trapped by a boulder while hiking and cut off his own arm with a Swiss Army knife. That was just a couple of years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Cagey\_Drifter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@Cagey\_Drifter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cagey_Drifter)\ **Post date:** [April 28, 2005, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-radical-auto-invasive-surgery-anyone-has-performed/301530/12 "2005-04-28T17:32:51Z")
I remember reading about a guy, in I think Scotland, who attempted to lobotomize himself with a power drill. I think I read it in one of those “News of the Weird” books.