There are many medical reasons that can cause black stools that are tarry with a foul smell, but sometimes dark stools are caused by eating certain foods or taking iron supplements. However, black stools can also be a result of bleeding, and the darker color indicates that the blood could be coming from a point in the upper gastrointestinal tract.
Gertrude Levandowski survived a 96-hour procedure at a Chicago hospital to remove a giant ovarian cyst; the longest surgery. The second longest surgery ever was 40 hours long and that was to remove 6 limbs from a 8 limed baby in India. But the most common longest surgery is spinal cord surgery it is a 14 hour surgery.
Colleen Kohse is believed to be the longest living cystic fibrosis patient/survivor of a double heart/lung transplant. She went to England in 1989 for that and is celebrating two decades of good health. She is here with her Louisiana Catahoula Leopard dog named Bandit. Photograph by: Ian Smith, Vancouver Sun.