A Southern California man stuck a butter knife into his stomach in a failed bid at self-surgery to remove a painful hernia, US police say.
The wife of the 63-year-old Glendale man called emergency services on Sunday night and told the emergency operator her husband was using a knife to remove a protruding hernia, Sergeant Tom Lorenz said.
"She said he had impaled himself with a knife," Sergeant Lorenz said.
Officers found the man naked on a patio lounge chair outside his apartment with a 15cm butter knife sticking out of his stomach.
The man's wife told officers that her husband was upset about the hernia and wanted to take it out.
While waiting for paramedics, the sergeant said, the man pulled out the knife and stuffed a cigarette he was smoking into the bleeding, open wound.
"What he was thinking, I don't know. I don't know if he was cauterising it [the wound]," Sergeant Lorenz said.
The man wasn't screaming or showing any signs of pain, the Sergeant said.
Based on his actions and statements from the wife, Sergeant Lorenz said the man was placed on psychiatric hold and taken to Los Angeles County-USC Medical Centre.
Because he's on psychiatric hold for up to 72 hours under the state Welfare and Institutions Code, Sergeant Lorenz said the man's name and condition cannot be released.
"You just never know what to expect," said Lorenz, who has been on the police force for 29 years. "I've seen self-mutilation, but not a manoeuvre like this."
