Doctors Find Live Spider Spinning Its Web Inside Woman’s Ear

Doctors have documented the terrifying moment they found a live spider crawling through a woman’s ear canal.

The bizarre (and quite frankly horrifying) discovery was made after the pensioner went to hospital complaining of itching and a ‘stinging pain’.

The spider is thought in the ear canal, which provided a warm and moist new ‘den’ for at least a week until the woman decided to seek medical attention at Mianyang Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine in Sichuan Province in south-western China.

Check out footage of the spider being removed here:

She was seen by ear, nose and throat specialist Liu Jun, who said the elderly female patient visited the hospital’s outpatient clinic with her daughter just last week, on April 22.

The woman, who hails from Yanting County, told doctors her symptoms were a ringing in her ears and occasional itching, followed by a ‘stinging pain’.

On closer inspection, Doctor Liu spotted a ball of silk in the woman’s ear canal, and so she was taken be given an otoscopy, an ear examination, which revealed that a live spider had been living inside.

A clip of the procedure shows the arachnid looking a little frightened by the medic’s light, as it appears from behind its web and scrambles to protect itself from the medical equipment.

Doctor Liu paralysed the spider with a chemical ear drops and removed it with tweezers a minute later.

Fortunately, the patient’s ear hadn’t suffered any damage at the hands of the spider, and was cleaned with a saline solution.

The pensioner believes that spider most probably crawled into her ear while she was working on a vineyard one week ago.

Doctor Liu said:

It was fortunately that the spider was small and didn’t rupture her eardrum, otherwise she might have suffered hearing loss.

It’s not common for small insects or animals to be found inside the ear, but this wasn’t an isolated case either.

He added:

I once treated a patient whose ear had been invaded by an insect which later laid eggs.

Personal hygiene is the key to preventing this. But should an insect enter your ear, do not try to remove it by yourself. Always seek medical attention.

If that’s not enough to leave you terrified of spiders, I don’t know what is.