Question

A 2-year-old girl has been brought to the ambulatory clinic by her mother who states, “She's put a pea in her ear, and I think she did it 2 days ago because that was the last time we ate them.” The nurse's otoscopic examination confirms the presence of this foreign body in the girl's middle ear. How should the nurse best respond to this assessment finding?

Answer 1

Having something stuck in the ear may leads to severe pain,hearing loss,infection and some times it may also effect the ear drum.This kind of situations can be mostly seen in young children and the immediate steps should be taken by a nurse after confirming that a foreign body in the ear of a child are:

• Initially check with the torch inside the ear,weather the object is visible or not.Because if the object is visible it can be easily removed by tilting the head.
• If this was not successful,then try to remove the object with the tweezers and be careful you should not push that object more deeper which may will put the ear of that child at risk.
• Try to pour a little vegetable oil or warm water (Not too hot) inside the ear gently in order to extract the object. The oil makes the object greasy and will come out easily.
• Always make the child comfortable and assure him that nothing was happened and he is safe

These are the basic and important steps to be taken by the nurse after coming to an assessment when she finds a foreign boy inside the ear of the child.