Doctors remove over 15 kg cyst from woman that made her look pregnant

LONDON: Doctors have removed a massive cyst weighing over 15 kg from a UK-based woman's stomach, which according to her was so large that it made her look pregnant.

Siobhan Foster, 26, started experiencing "excruciating" stomach pain in March 2022, and doctors later discovered a massive 40 cm (about 15.7 inches) cyst carrying 16 litres of fluid on her broad ligament, which contains blood vessels to the ovaries, fallopian tubes, and uterus, New York Post reported .

The news was first reported by South West News Service.

“It was very large, and I struggled with breathing, eating," Foster was quoted as saying.

“People were thinking 'she’s pregnant',” she added.

However, the road to surgery wasn’t an easy one for Foster. The procedure was postponed for 11 months as she was placed on a waiting list to have the cyst removed by the UK's National Health Service, the country's publicly funded healthcare system.

In those 11 months, Foster's cyst grew to be the size of a toddler, weighing 35 pounds (over 15 kg).

She even had to quit her job in childcare because things became very difficult, the report mentioned.

Foster finally underwent laparoscopic surgery in June to remove the benign cyst. During the 4.5-hour procedure, doctors drained 16 litres of fluid from the cyst.

“The cyst was getting into a dangerous place, connecting to my kidney. It was a shock,” she said.

After the surgery, Foster's size dropped from 24 to 18, and she is now able to live a normal life, the report said.

Similarly, in the US, a 20-year-old woman weighing nearly 230 kg was able to remove her large ovarian cyst after undergoing surgery at a hospital in Jacksonville, Florida.