Woman's suspected lung cancer may be fruit pit from 28 years ago

Seminole - A Florida woman may have some good news after 28 years of suffering. For over two decades the 62-year-old woman has suffered with a debilitating cough.

The woman told the media her life has been difficult. "My life had just been horrible," she said. Blanca Riveron, who moved to the U.S. from Cuba in 1994, has been treated for asthma and pneumonia "countless times," over the years. Yet, her condition never improved. After coughing up some blood last winter, her daughter took her to the doctor's to take another look. According to WTSP News, Riveron was told by her doctor in Dec. 2011 there was a dark spot on her lung and suspected it might be a cancerous mass. When Riveron called her other daughter, still living in Cuba, to tell her what the doctor's said, her daughter brought up an old memory. The daughter recalled a fruit pit her mother had inhaled several years ago. When her children were still small, Riveron had yelled to them and accidentally inhaled a seed from a nispero fruit. She'd forgotten all about that incident. Riveron said, "I told my daughter no, it can't be it. It's been 28 years - I mean it can't be it." Oddly enough, a few weeks later she had another heavy coughing fit and out popped the fruit seed. Now she's hopeful she does not have lung cancer. Aspiration of foreign objects can lead to serious health conditions, and can be a dangerous situation, as medical experts note in case studies. While young children commonly inhale foreign objects, this can happen to adults as well. And just sometimes the aspirated object isn't detected. Seeds are one of the most commonly inhaled foreign objects, according to Medscape. While not gone completely, Riveron's coughing is much better since the pit extracted itself. While doctors have not yet cleared her from the spot being cancer, she believes the mass they saw on her tests was the nispero pit. WTSP reported since she coughed up the pit, Riveron "feels like a new person." "She's even been able to blow up a balloon for my son. She had never been able to do that," said her daughter, Dayana Noda. She is due back to be examined again by doctors in a couple of weeks.