No Money and In Pain, Chinese Man Saws Off Own Leg at Home

From NetEase:

Man Has No Money for Surgery, Saws Off Own Diseased Right Leg At Home

A metal saw, a small fruit knife, and a back-scratcher wrapped with a towel. Baoding [in Hefei province] tough guy Zheng Yanliang used these three simple tools and sawed off his entire right leg, which was suffering some strange ailment, at home on his bed. He bit off four molars enduring the pain. Today, the same strange ailment spreads pitilessly on his left leg. Zheng Yanliang hopes that kind-hearted people can give help, cure the strange disease that torments him, and provide him with a prosthetic limb so that he can once again support his wife and daughter.

Rural tough guy suddenly contracts strange disease

47-year-old Zheng Yanliang is a villager of Dongzang village, Xingyuan county, Baoding city. Before contracting the strange disease, Zheng Yanliang was the backbone of his family and a well-known tough guy in the village. His family has 4 mu of farmland, planting in the spring and harvesting in the fall. When the fields lie fallow, he goes to the nearby brick kiln factory to work, without fear for any kind of hard and laborious work. On 2012 January 28, on the afternoon of the 6th day of the first month in the lunar new year, Zheng Yanliang first felt pain in his abdomen and then quickly migrated to his two legs. With slicing pain, he shed beads of sweat. After managing to walk to the village clinic and getting an injection of painkillers, Zheng Yanliang’s two legs could no longer stand. Afterward, he was taken to several major hospitals in Baoding and Beijing for examination, ultimately being diagnosed with massive arterial thrombosis/embolism in both legs of unknown cause. On angiographs, all of the arteries in his right leg and all of the arteries below the knee in his left leg have disappeared.

After the doctors of multiple major hospitals reviewed the diagnosis results, they all said this strange disease is very rarely seen in the entire country, so far is untreatable, only conservative treatment methods can be used, and determined that Zheng Yanliang at most won’t live more than another month. Here, to see the doctors, the family’s savings had already been used up. Without a choice, Zheng Yanliang was brought back home. Upon thinking back on all this, his wife Shen Zhonghong collapsed in tears: Over the span of a little over three months, Zheng Yanliang has been tormented by pain to the point of fuzzy consciousness, screaming so that his surrounding neighbors cannot sleep. Regardless of whether it is the dark night or the bright day, he can only lean or sit, unable to lie flat. For other people, one dose of strong pain-killers a day is effective, but even 3 doses a day is ineffective for her husband. Several days later, bruises began appearing all over her husband’s right leg and then the skin turned black and began to ulcerate and fester all over, with even the bone frighteningly exposed.

Tough guy saws off leg at home

Zheng Yanliang says that not only did his ulcerating right leg completely lose its ability to walk, the ulcerating parts continuously spread upward, thus giving him the idea of amputation. However at the time, simply eating had become a problem for the family and they simply hadn’t the money to go to the hospital for the surgery. He had also asked the doctor of the village clinic to help him amputate, but the doctor simply didn’t dare do so, so he began thinking of amputating on his own.

At a little past 11 on the morning of 2012 April 14, Zheng Yanliang had his exhausted wife who had been taking care of him day after day go to the western bedroom to sleep and rest. Then he found a red plastic fruit knife, a metal saw, and then wrapped a towel around a back-scratcher he put into his mouth and bit on. There, on the bed in the eastern bedroom, he began administering amputation surgery on himself.

Over 20 minutes later, when Shen Zhonghong returned to the eastern bedroom after awaking from a nightmare, she was dumbstruck by the scene: Her husband’s right leg had been sawed off about 15 centimeters from the hip, and the metal saw used for the amputation had snapped into two from the excessive force, and on the table were 4 molars that had been bitten off. Fortunately, because of the thrombosis, there wasn’t much blood during the amputation.

After the amputation, the festering of his Zheng Yanliang’s right leg finally stopped, but the strange disease began to spread on his left leg. The festering on his left leg spread from his ankle all the way up to about 10 centimeters below his knee. To save money, Zheng Yanliang came up with a crude method for coping with the festering: First using large amounts of iodine disinfectant to clean, then wrapping with gauze applied with erythromycin stearate, and then tying infant diapers on the outside to absorb the pus. However, even if the medication is changed two to three times a day, it still couldn’t stop the upward spread of the festering. Large amounts of pain-killers likewise could not stop the acute pain produced at the festering parts.

Hoping to get an artificial limb

Zheng Yanliang says his wife has diabetes and heart disease, and in addition to taking care of him, she also has to tend to their four mu of fields. Their 17-year-old daughter had long ago dropped out of school to work at a shoe factory, and is the family’s only source of income. As a man in his prime years, he is not only unable to support the family, he has also become a burden to the family, and this makes him extremely sad. “Other than my two legs, there is not a single problem with my body,” Zheng Yanliang says. Even in his dreams, he wants to get back up and support his wife, daughter, family. The pain of sawing off his leg was nothing to him and what worries him the most now is how his family can survive. He hopes there can be kind-hearted people who can give help, help him cure the strange disease he suffers from, and then install a prosthetic limb. That way, he’ll be able to take care of himself as well as do some simple manual labor and support his family. If you’re willing to extend a kind-hearted hand to help free Zheng Yanliang from his strange disease, you can dial this reporter’s number: 13630853382

Comments from NetEase:

网易浙江省杭州市手机网友 ip：211.140.*.*:

Even the Bone Scrapping Healing of General Guan Yu wasn’t as painful as this! What a pity for a tough guy like this. I too am poor and owe a lot of money. However, I’m willing to help a bit, however much I can. Requesting how to help.

加qq1328769505 [网易福建省泉州市安溪县网友]：

Can’t afford to live, can’t afford to die. Can’t afford to get sick. Can’t afford to get married. Can’t afford a house. Can’t afford a car!

网易天津市手机网友 ip：111.161.*.*:

Russia has nationwide free medical care.

网易山东省青岛市网友 [适度腐败好]： (responding to above)

Macau enjoys fruits of reform: Every person gets 8000 yuan.

网易上海市网友 ip：180.164.*.*: (responding to above)

The Chinese people enjoy the fruits of reform: Housing prices of over 10k for every square meter!

隔着胸罩摸乳 [网易上海市手机网友]：

Bone Scraping Healing is nothing next to this!

堕落好好男人 [网易美国网友]：

Just what led him to do such a thing?

网易湖南省长沙市手机网友 ip：113.240.*.*: (responding to above)

Blessed socialism! You, as someone living in an evil capitalist country, cannot understand the happiness that is ours!

网易四川省阿坝州网友 [112317453梦里有许愿]：

I want to know just where is our government? Where is our Red Cross Society? When treasure is unearthed, you people appear, and you people are more enthusiastic than anyone else when it comes to making a fuss calling on everyone to donate money. But now when you are needed, where are you people? Where???

网易广东省广州市网友 ip：113.96.*.*: (responding to above)

They are focused on your speech and if it is unpleasing to their eyes, they’ll have you go have tea.

网易江苏省苏州市网友(58.240.*.*)：

Merciful Buddha, I’ve already gotten the donation account from the reporter, as follows:
1. Zheng Yanliang’s mobile phone number: 15931477970
2. Account address: Baoding city Qingyuan county Rural Credit Union
6210 2100 5130 1017 537
3. Account Holder Name: Zheng Yanliang
Everyone let’s give him some help, merciful Buddha.

网易湖北省武汉市网友 [AllenK]： (responding to above)

I ding~

网易辽宁省沈阳市网友 ip：175.168.*.*:

Definitely don’t transfer money, this account is for scamming people’s money.

网易河南省郑州市手机网友 ip：61.52.*.*:

Socialism is great, if there’s a problem, turn to the government!

ganganlulu [网易山东省手机网友]： 2013-10-10 05:47:53 发表

Go find the Red Cross Society.

七个都不能讲 [网易意大利手机网友]： 2013-10-10 05:51:06 发表

Even the handicapped must provide for the government!

网易甘肃省张掖市手机网友 ip：124.152.*.*:

I love my country.