A two-year-old girl in Delhi recently died after accidentally biting into a green chilly at home. Doctors at AIIMS said the girl, otherwise healthy, choked to death despite attempts to resuscitate her. The autopsy report said the death was caused by respiratory failure following aspiration of gastric contents into her respiratory tract.
Consuming chilly has often led to several minutes of trauma for those not used to spice but in the case of two year old Aaarti (name changed) the incident had extreme tragic consequence.
The girl, who had bitten green chilly accidentally at home, died in spite of all medical intervention within 24 hours. Her autopsy, which was conducted at AIIMS, later confirmed that the death was caused by respiratory failure following aspiration of gastric contents into respiratory tract.
Dr Chittaranjan Behera, the autopsy surgeon, said: “Aspiration of gastric contents resulting in death due to respiratory failure is not uncommon. However, this is the first such case involving the accidental bite of a chilly at our hospital. It is rarely reported in medico/legal literature.”
The doctors have published the case study of the victim in the Medico-Legal Journal aiming to educate the medical community and public at large about the risk of consuming such substances.
As per the report, the two-year-old had bouts of vomiting due to burning sensation caused by chilly bite. Though she became conscious immediately afterwards, the vomiting continued.
Doctors say it is possible that the gastric content or vomit aspirated into the windpipe which choked her and she stopped breathing. Though the doctors at a local hospital she was rushed to managed to revive her initially, the girl died within 24 hours.
