Man saws off own leg to avoid hospital bills

A Chinese farmer from a village in the northern Chinese province of Hebei, whose doctors told him that an infection had left him just one month to live, amputated his own leg using nothing but a saw and a fruit knife.             

Even before he was forced to take matters into his own hands, Zheng Yanliang, 47 years, was known at his home town for being a "tough guy".         

Zheng who was forced into the makeshift surgery suffers from severe arterial thrombosis in both legs, survives on a diet of ineffective painkillers, and is unable to pay the hospital’s fee for surgery.             

According to reports, Zheng waited until his wife had gone to bed before getting started, and when she returned, she was shocked by the fact that her husband had successfully removed his own leg about 15cm below the hip.                    

Reports added that the metal saw used for the amputation had snapped into two from the excessive force.                 

Last year, Zheng, began to experience bursts of sharp pain in his stomach, which shot down both legs. After heading to Beijing, where he was diagnosed with the embolism, doctors told him that it was incurable, and gave him month to live - alongside a fat bill.              

Three months on, he was still alive; suffering though from dizziness and pain so acute he kept his neighbors awake with the screams.               

Following the coverage of the story, Sky News reported that Dr Zhang Qiang, from the Shanghai Wode Medical Center promised to cover all of Zheng’s medical costs from now on.            

"My medical colleagues and I will provide him with free medical services," Dr Zhang said on his micro blog.