50 Complicated Facts about Human Organs

Agenesis refers to the failure of an organ to develop during embryonic growth and development due to the absence of primordial tissue. Agenesis of wisdom teeth differs by population, ranging from practically zero in Aboriginal Tasmanians to nearly 100% in indigenous Mexicans.

27. Black Hairy Tongue is a harmless condition that is often caused by an overgrowth of bacteria or using too many astringents. The tongue turns black and the taste buds grow longer than normal making the tongue appear to have long black hair.

28. Although the urinary bladder may hold as much as 600 ml of urine, the desire to urinate is usually experienced when it contains about 150 ml.

29. The cremaster muscle is responsible for moving your testicles up or down. It expands and contracts according to temperature by moving them further from the body when it’s warm and closer to the body when it’s cold.

30. Saxophone Penis a.k.a. Ram's Horn is the result of a blocked lymph node or a bacterial infection that leaves the penis swollen and twisted.

If a person receives bone marrow from someone who is a different ABO type, the recipient’s blood type will eventually convert to the donor's type.

32. Pain signals sent by an irritated diaphragm will be felt in the shoulder. The stabbing sensations near the heart that are sometimes felt after consuming a fatty meal are often confused with heart attacks but are nothing more than symptoms of indigestion, which can irritate one’s diaphragm.

33. When the liver fails to produce bile, your poop doesn't get the regular brown pigments so it becomes white.

34. The act of vomiting involves a complex series of chain-link reactions by your body that connect to a "vomit center" in the brain. The lower digestive system in cases of perceived poisoning shuts down and causes the stomach to convulse in order to bring everything back up the way it came in.

35. Making predictions impedes the formation of memories. Trying to predict what is going to happen next in any given moment, impedes your brain’s ability to encode your current moment in memory.

Stomach aneurysms (abdominal aortic aneurysms) exist and can suddenly kill you much like brain aneurysms. The biggest modifiable risk factor for abdominal aortic aneurysms is not smoking. As long as you're not a smoker (less than 100 cigarettes in a lifetime), you're doing all you can to prevent it.

37. Unlike adult cataracts, which can be removed after years and normal eyesight is restored, severe pediatric cataracts must be treated within weeks or the brain will learn to permanently ignore the defective eye.

38. Having allergies decreases your risk of a brain tumor by nearly 40%.

39. Pushing your thumb into the roof of your mouth gets rid of brain freeze.

40. While undergoing screening for kidney donation to her son, a 64-year-old woman found that she had no spleen despite never undergoing surgical removal. She was diagnosed with a rare birth defect and still was able to donate her kidney.

Women get drunk faster than men because the female body produces smaller quantities of an enzyme called 'Alcohol Dehydrogenase' Tthis enzyme is released in the liver and breaks down alcohol.

42. People who work with birds or own many birds can get a disease called "Bird Fancier's Lung." It is triggered by exposure to avian proteins present in the dry dust of droppings or feathers of a variety of birds. This condition can cause shortness of breath, fever, dry cough, chest pain, anorexia, weight loss, fatigue, and progressive pulmonary fibrosis.

43. It is possible to become internally decapitated. It happens when the skull separates from the spinal column during severe head injury, but the head is still attached connected by soft tissues. Only 15% of the sufferers survive the trauma and subsequent surgery.

44. Serge Voronoff was a French surgeon who was nicknamed the "monkey gland man." He claimed to be able to rejuvenate his millionaire patients by transplanting them with testicles of executed criminals. He eventually turned to use monkey testicles when supplies ran low. He treated over 500 men were with his procedure.

45. Women receiving radiation to their pelvis can have their ovaries transplanted into their forearm to be retrieved in the future for IVF and maintain their fertility.

Since every baby girl is born with up to two million eggs in her ovaries, a woman who is pregnant with a girl is not only carrying her baby but also the beginnings of her grandchild, and her diet and lifestyle can impact the make-up of the eggs in the child’s reproductive system.

47. The reason you need to have a full bladder when you go for an ultrasound is that it moves the bowels from the pelvis and into the abdomen, making it easier to see the ovaries and uterus.

48. A potential complication during vaginal delivery is a "Uterine Inversion." In order to treat said inversion, the attending doctor quite literally fists the female. The doctor grabs the uterus through the vagina and manually pushes it back into place. Leaving it untreated can result in massive hemorrhage.

49. Endometrial ablation is a procedure where a balloon full of liquid heated up to 90°C (194°F) is inserted into a woman's uterus to burn away the lining and thus reduce the menstrual bleeding.

50. Oxytocin is a chemical which is used to induce labor in humans. It was first discovered when Sir Henry H. Dale found that an extract from the human posterior pituitary gland contracted the uterus of a pregnant cat.