Woman Forced To Remove Surgery Stitches At Housing Complex Gate Due To Lockdown

A woman in China who recently underwent cosmetic surgery was forced to have her eyelid stitches removed at the gate of her residential complex amidst a strict COVID-19 lockdown.

The Shanghai woman had gotten a double eyelid procedure in March at a cosmetic medical institute. Unfortunately, when it was time for the sutures to come out last week, the woman had no way of getting outside her housing complex to meet her doctor. The residential complex had gone under lockdown as part of measures taken by authorities to stop the spread of the coronavirus in the city, according to the South China Morning Post.

The unidentified woman grew anxious about the stitches and spoke to Dr. Zhou Zhaoping about the conundrum.

“I am not allowed to leave my residential block. Do you think I can postpone the time to remove the sutures? I feel they have been embedded in my flesh,” she was quoted telling the doctor.

The doctor told her they couldn't delay taking out the sutures any further.

“The stitches will be very hard to remove if we leave it for too long, and it could even cause scarring,” he told Shanghai-based news outlet The Paper, as reported by Insider.

Dr. Zhou first suggested sending the woman a surgical blade and tweezers so that a neighbor could help her remove it. But when the woman couldn’t find anyone to help her, her doctor said he had “no choice” but to perform the procedure at the gate of her housing complex.

Separated by a fence, the doctor removed his patient’s sutures whilst following COVID-19 protocols as best as they could. Dr. Zhou also noted that he and the patient had both tested negative before they stood on either side of the gate to remove the stitches.

"It wasn't easy to do it while standing because my hands would shake, so I asked her to keep her chin on the gate to stay still," Dr. Zhou told the Shanghai-based outlet. "The security guard at the gate was watching us, but we both have negative COVID tests, and we both wore masks, so I figured the risk [of transmitting the virus] was low."