A 99-year-old woman named Rose Marie Bentley suffered from situs inversus, a rare condition in which vital organs are the reverse.
She lived 99 years of her life with her vital organs on the opposite sides of her body, says report.
According to CNN, the 99-year-old lady died of natural causes and lived her life without any major health issues. After her death, her family got to know that she suffered from situs inversus with levocardia.
“Instead of having a stomach on the left, which is normal, her stomach was on the right,” Cameron Walker, an assistant professor at Oregon Health and Science University, told CNN. “Her liver, which normally occurs predominantly on the right, was predominantly on the left. Her spleen was on the right side instead of its normal occurrence on the left. And then the rest of her digestive tract, the ascending colon, was inverted as well.”
During spring 2018, 26-year-old medical student Warren Nielsen and four of his classmates examined a cadaver in the chilly dissection lab at Oregon Health and Science University in Portland.
The students noticed that blood vessels in the woman’s chest were abnormal.
“When we looked at the organs of her abdominal cavity — which has the organs of the digestive tract — they were transposed entirely right to left,” Walker told USA Today. “I’d never seen this before and the students were every bit as fascinated.”
But, Rose Marie’s heart was in good shape.
“Her heart was missing a large vein that’s normally on the right side,” Nielsen said.
He and his team called the professors over and asked: “Where’s the inferior vena cava? Are we missing it? Are we crazy?”
“And they kind of rolled their eyes,” Nielsen said, “Like, ‘how can these students miss this big vessel?’ And they come over and that’s when the hubbub starts. They’re like ‘Oh, my God, this is totally backwards!’ “
Rose Marie’s digestive tract, the ascending colon, was inverted as well.
“Her vein continued through her diaphragm, along the thoracic vertebrae, up and around and over the aortic arch and then emptied into the right side of her heart,” Walker said.
“Normally speaking, none of us has a vessel that does that directly,” he added.
“And instead of having a stomach on the left, which is normal, her stomach was on the right,” Walker said.point 293 |
“Her liver, which normally occurs predominantly on the right, was predominantly on the left.point 85 | Her spleen was on the right side instead of its normal occurrence on the left.point 149 | And then the rest of her digestive tract, the ascending colon, was inverted as well.point 219 |
”point 7 | 1
Rose Marie’s family was surprised after knowing this. Her daughter, Ginger Robbins, said, “We had no reason to believe there was anything like that wrong.’’
“She was always very healthy,“
She would’ve just thought it was funny.”