A case of buccal mucosa injury caused by an automatic nail-gun

We report a patient who was admitted because of a nail stuck in the mouth. The patient was a male carpenter in his twenties.While making a bookshelf at home, he accidentally shot a nail from his nail-gun into his left cheek.He came to the hospital 3 weeks after this accident, when the head of the nail protruded from his left cheek.On an X-ray film, the nail was found to be 90mm long. It was subsequently removed with the patient under general anesthesia.There have been no previous reports of nail injury to the cheek via the oral cavity and no reports about a nail 90 mm in length entering the cheek.The patient did not notice that a nail had penetrated his cheek at the time of injury.It was an unusual case because of the time that had elapsed until the foreign body was detected.The causes of foreign body injury are changing. We must acquire new knowledge to meet such changing needs.