"Authentication" of legend: "Scrotum Self-Repair"
- Attendees
- meter@bmerhbfc
- Colin Kemp 7K76 BNR
- Author
- Colin Kemp 7K76 BNR
- Summary
For your information:
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Sep 10 23:58:00 1995
Bulletin To: BLAH HA HA HA!
From: Heather (H.) Mullen (BNR) Dept 7X44 SKY
Subject: "Authentication" of legend: "Scrotum Self-Repair"
Snick snick snick snicker.
First time I've ever seen a seemingly real "authentication" of this
particualr urban legend.
Enjoy.
---forwarded-message---->
Sep 05 15:33 1995
To: Christin (C.M.) Boyd (BNR) Dept 7X75 SKY
Heather (H.) Mullen (BNR) Dept 7X44 SKY
From: '[email protected]' (BNR400)
Subject: Testicle fun...! !Talk about foolish check the story at the end?
Attached: 1 UNIX File: ORIGINAL.HEADER 800 bytes
Sender: '[email protected]' (BNR400)
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From rlr Tue Aug 29 15:29:50 1995
Date: Tue, 29 Aug 1995 15:20:08 -0400
From: rlr (Rader = Darn Jar All Dry Error)
To: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], kfc,
patberry, map, rgs, jwg, alison, asg, bp, abs, md, yms, tdj,
[email protected], [email protected], ljw, mdp, dec, dro, claes, tac,
shp, bjs, gmg, kk, [email protected], rdr, tws, lsl, gsl, rac,
dnb, mrt
Subject: Talk about foolish check the story at the end?
[this one gets around. The version at the end has been edited somewhat,
as I forwarded an early email version circa late '91, and it was slightly
different - rlr]
> Most of us are intimately acquainted with the infamous "Scrotum
> Self-Repair" article that has become a truly ubiquitous piece of
> xeroxlore. (If not, it follows at the end of this article.) As others
> have mentioned here, the original article did appear in a legitimate
> medical journal (Medical Aspects of Human Sexuality) in July of 1991.
> The possiblity remained, however, that this article was some sort of hoax
> or joke, perhaps sent in by someone other than the person named as the
> author.
>
> With the assistance of Ted Frank and Terry Wood, I managed to locate and
> contact the doctor named in the article. I wanted to find out whether he
> was really the one who had submitted the article, and whether he had
> actually treated the patient in question himself. I was a little
> apprehensive about approaching a total stranger and asking whether or not
> he had really treated a patient with a stapled scrotum, but Dr. Morton
> turned out to be quite helpful. He sent me a short letter answering all
> my questions, and he invited me to call him if I wanted to discuss the
> matter further. This is what he had to say:
>
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>
> Dr. William A. Morton, Jr., M.D.
> West Chester, PA
>
26 February 1994
Dear Mr. Mikkelson:
I am now retired, but submitted the article; treated the patient
about 20-25 years ago and have had phone calls from all corners of the
U.S. ever since. A xerox is on the billboard in practically every army
post, college dorm, men's club, etc. I've had interviews/phone by
talk-show hosts, etc. No Phil Donahue yet!
The man actually came to me 3 days post-injury when the fever,
swelling, and pain of secondary infection frightened him. Though
unlikely, tetanus was even a possibility. He was not that impressed with the
pain of the moment of injury -- it happened so quickly, like losing
your fingertip to a band-saw -- and was unaware his left testis was
probably propelled up into the rafters of the machine shop where he
worked.
Every man who questions me imagines the initial pain to have been
intense, but should realize that once the testis had been ripped out
(gasp!) there was not the continuing discomfort one would experience from
a first-class kick in the nuts!
I saw him again 5 years later in the hospital for a non-urologic
problem. Incidentally, the Navy has left xeroxes in every bar along the
Mediterranean from Gibraltar to Tel Aviv -- my son's girlfriend saw one in
Greece 2 years ago.
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Scrotum Self-Repair by William A. Morton, Jr, MD
One morning I was called to the emergency room by the head ER
nurse. She directed me to a patient who had refused to describe his
problem other than to say that he "needed a doctor who took care of men's
troubles." The patient, about 40, was pale, febrile, and obviously
uncomfortable, and had little to say as he gingerly opened his trousers
to expose a bit of angry red and black-and-blue scrotal skin.
After I asked the nurse to leave us, the patient permitted me to remove his
trousers, shorts, and two or three yards of foul-smelling stained gauze wrapped
about his scrotum, which was swollen to twice the size of a grapefruit and
extremely tender. A jagged zig-zag laceration, oozing pus and blood, extended
down the left scrotum.
Amid the matted hair, edematous skin, and various exudates, I saw some
half-buried dark linear objects and asked the patient what they were.
Several days earlier, he replied, he had injured himself in the machine shop
where he worked, and had closed the laceration himself with a heavy-duty
stapling gun. The dark objects were one-inch staple of the
type used in putting up wallboard.
We x-rayed the patient's scrotum to locate the staples; admitted him to the
hospital; and gave him tetanus antitoxin, broad-spectrum
antibacterial therapy, and hexachlorophene sitz baths prior to surgery
the next morning. The procedure consisted of exploration and debridement
of the left side of the scrotal pouch. Eight rusty staples were
retrieved, and the skin edges were trimmed and freshened. The left testis
had been avulsed and was missing. The stump of the spermatic cord was
recovered at the inguinal canal, debrided, and the vessels ligated
properly, though not much of a hematoma was present. Through-and-through
Penrose drains were sutured loosely in site, and the skin was loosely
closed.
Convalescence was uneventful, and before his release from the ospital
less than a week later, the patient confided the rest of his story to me.
An unmarried loner, he usually didn't leave the machine shop at lunchtime with
his co-workers. Finding himself alone, he had begun the regular practice of
mastubating by holding his penis against the canvas
drive-belt of a large floor-based piece of running machinery. One day, as
he approached orgasm, he lost his concentration and leaned too close to
the belt. When his scrotum suddenly became caught between the pulley-wheel and
the drive-belt, he was thrown into the air and landed a
few feet away. Unaware that he had lost his left testis, and perhaps too>
stunned to feel much pain, he stapled the wound closed and resumed
work. I can only assume he abandoned this method of self-gratification.
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> | David P. Mikkelson Calif. State Univ., Northridge Northridge, CA USA |
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