A 28-year-old male patient from Turkey presented to our clinic with complaints of palpable foreign bodies under the skin in the dorsolateral side of his right foot (Fig. ). Except for the palpable and moving body of about 6 cm length under the skin in his foot, he had no functional complaints. An X-ray demonstrated the presence of a K-wire of about 6 cm length in front of the lateral malleolus in the dorsolateral side of his foot (Fig. ). There was a cerclage wire from the tension band fixation of his patella in the ipsilateral knee (Fig. ). There was no diagnostic challenge. Our patient explained that he was operated on by another orthopedic surgeon in the same hospital after a patellar fracture in 2007 and he had not attended regular checks. He also reported that a wire similar to the one in the X-ray had protruded through his skin in 2009 and he had removed the wire by pulling it out. This statement explained why the K-wire was not in place.\nOn physical examination, our patient showed no restriction in his knee movement. Routine blood test results showed no abnormalities. Palpation of the K-wire showed that the wire was mobile under his skin (Fig. ). Our patient reported that, after removing the first wire, he had not felt any serious discomfort during the migration of the other wire over a period of 5 years.\nOur patient was taken to the operating room. After staining, a 3-mm skin incision was made that coincided with the proximal end of the K-wire, and the K-wire was pulled out with the help of clamp (Fig. ). Our patient was discharged on the same day. The cerclage wire in his patella was not removed to avoid creating complications and because of our patient’s unwillingness to have it removed.
A 52-year-old man underwent surgery for an AC joint dislocation 5 years ago. The dislocation was fixed using a K-wire. The patient did not require a follow-up appointment as he had no complaints. The patient's dominant extremity was right-sided and he was a retired construction worker. The patient presented to our outpatient clinic with swelling at the back of the neck. Radiological evaluation revealed that a broken tip of the K-wire used in the fixation of the AC joint dislocation had migrated to the back of the neck (). The broken K-wire was removed under local anaesthesia via mini-incision (). No intervention was performed for the AC joint. The remaining broken pin was not removed from the shoulder.