When a 6-month-old boy returned to a pediatric urology clinic for a checkup before circumcision, his right testicle felt small and firm, raising concern that it had twisted around the time of birth. Surgery found the testicle healthy. The problem was a greenish-brown lump just below it: hardened meconium, the dark, sticky stool that builds up in a baby's intestines before birth.
Ash N. Zawerton and Robert E. Steckler of Geisinger in Pennsylvania described the case in the Journal of Surgical Case Reports on Sept. 1. The condition, meconium periorchitis, is uncommon but well documented. What set this case apart was where the material ended up: outside the tunica vaginalis, the protective sac that normally surrounds the testicle.
