A woman living with a giant pus-filled cyst on her head was filmed having it popped by a top doctor – only for things to get a bit messy.
Samantha, who appeared on The Bad Skin Clinic, said she felt “disgusting” and was relieved when Dr Emma Craythorne said she’d be able to remove the boil at her Harley Street clinic.
She jokes the cyst is a “sideways unicorn horn” while being examined, and Dr Emma is quick to diagnose it.
“So this looks like a pilar cyst,” she explains, “They’re very common actually, but they’re not that common that you see them get quite as big as this.”
All scrubbed up and with masks on, Dr Emma invites Samantha into the operating room before numbing her head cyst with a local anesthetic.
Making her first incision into Samantha’s scalp, Dr Emma removes a wedge of skin so she can get at the cyst wall that lies beneath.
“Pilar cysts don’t tend to be that fibrous and stuck down under the surrounding tissue, they tend to grow as they push everything out of the way,” Dr Emma explains.
“They’re just desperate almost to leave the skin.”
Feeling her way around the cyst wall bulging out of the incision wound, Dr Emma prepares to squeeze the cyst out, ideally in one piece, sack and all.
“It looks like a quails’ egg,” Mottie, Dr Emma’s Assistant, jokes.
With Mottie’s help, Dr Emma starts squeezing, forcing the cyst sack to burst through the incision wound.
But the procedure isn’t as squeaky clean as Dr Emma had hoped, as the cyst wall ruptures, covering her in a flood of yellow pus, although she isn’t bothered.
“It’s amazing, isn’t it? That was super satisfying,” Dr Emma laughs.
“It looks like cottage cheese!” Mottie adds.
Samantha can’t believe her eyes and gasps: “That has been growing inside of me!?” she gasps.
Later, she says: “I feel amazing, I can’t believe that Dr Emma has been able to remove the bump.
“It really will make a difference to my life!”