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Cough dislodged a pool cue tip that was stuck up my nose for TWELVE years

By Lauren Paxman
Updated: 13:16 EST, 17 November 2011

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A mother who had suffered from constant flu-like symptoms for 12 years was cured by a cough... which dislodged the tip of a pool cue that had been stuck up her nose the whole time.

Chantel Faill, 31, had puzzled doctors for years with her constant headaches, runny noses, infections and swellings on the left side of her face since a minor accident in 1999.

The mother-of-three was in a pub on Boxing Day when a male friend - who was carrying a pool cue - picked her up in a bear hug.

Unexpected solution: Chantel Faill with the tip of a pool cue that had been stuck up her nose for 12 years

But he leant forward as he put her down and speared Chantel in the top of the right hand side of her mouth with the cue.

She was rushed to hospital but medics were unable to do anything to her wound as it was in her mouth and sent her home with painkillers.

Former chambermaid Chantel had suffered painful headaches, eye infections and a constant runny nose ever since the incident. But her doctor was unable to come up with a cure.

Her suffering ended as suddenly as it had begun when she coughed - and felt a hard object shoot into her mouth.

Chantel discovered the tip of the pool cue encased in a two cm sized piece of flesh - which had turned green inside her head.

She rushed to hospital where doctors told her she was lucky to be alive and explained how the tip must have worked its way through her cheek bone into her sinuses.

Long-time sufferer: Chantel aged 20, shortly after the incident when her friend gave her a bear hug, inadvertently piercing her mouth with a pool cue

Chantel, from Broughton, Lincolnshire, said: 'It was such a huge shock. I'm still taking it in to be honest.

'When it happened back in 1999 it was really horrific, my whole face was swollen for weeks and everyone kept asking me what I'd done.

'I thought that was it though. I never thought that my illness and headaches were anything to do with the accident.

'In Summer I'd write it off as hay fever, then feeling unwell or being pregnant and in winter I just thought I had flu or a bad cold.

'It was always one side of my face, my nose was always running or blocked. It felt like a huge build-up of pressure and I could never understand it.

'I had this awful cold and was all sniffly and it sounds awful but I coughed up some mucus and this pool cue tip was inside.'

Chantel was out with family and friends in Kirton-In-Lindsey, Lincs., on Boxing Day of 1999 when the snooker cue became embedded in her head.

When Chantel was rushed into hospital on Boxing Day 1999, medics asked if she wanted to have an X-ray - but she turned it down as it was not seen as necessary.

After the pool cue tip came out, she had a more thorough examination.

Chantel said: 'I went to hospital and was given strong painkillers. A CT scan confirmed that it had gone into my cheek bone.

'The bone had been broken when the snooker cue hit and the tip went into the sinuses in my cheek.

'It then moved into my right nasal package, before I coughed it out.'

Head injury: The snooker cue tip entered the skull through the roof of Chantel's mouth and moved into the sinuses in her cheek. It then moved into her right nasal package

On September 26, Chantel underwent an operation to clear her nasal passages and sinuses at Scunthorpe General Hospital.

She was operated on by Mr Mohamed Abbas-Ali, an ear, nose and throat consultant at the hospital.

He said: 'Chantel's injury was certainly unusual in many respects, from the way it happened to the way she coughed the pool cue tip out of her nose years after the initial trauma.

'It is not uncommon to see amalgam used for teeth filling in the sinus cavity on routine x-ray of the face or scanning of the sinuses with no residual effects.

'However, it is the first time I have heard of a pool cue tip doing the same for 12 years.

'The tip, which is radiolucent, cannot be seen on x-rays and that is why no one ever suspected a foreign body was lodged in her sinus cavity.

'It wasn't until she coughed it out and we used a CT scan to see where exactly it had been hiding all of these years.'

Chantel is now recovering from her operation at home with her three children, aged nine, six and two and her long-term partner.