by Adeola Balogun

Doctors have made a shocking discovery inside the ear canal of an Australian man.

A large cockroach, said to be a whopping two centimetres, was found in the ear of Hendrik Helmer.

Helmer felt a sharp pain in his ear and suspected an insect had found its way there but he had no idea about just how large it was.

The Mirror reports:

The Darwin resident said that he immediately suspected that an insect may have burrowed into him whilst he was sleeping.

Unable to cope with the intense pain he attempted to use a vacuum cleaner to suck it out and then use water to flush it out but this only seemed to anger the pest.

At a loss as to what to do Mr Helmer, who works as a supervisor at a warehouse, woke his flatmate who took him to Royal Darwin Hospital where a doctor eventually managed to remove it.

Mr Helmer, who lives in Karama, said: “I was hoping it wasn’t a poisonous spider.

“I was hoping it didn’t bite me.

“Whatever was in my ear didn’t like it at all.”

When he reached the hospital he was quickly seen by a doctor who placed olive oil down his ear canal, which forced the cockroach to move even deeper.

Thankfully, it began to die, allowing the doctor to use forceps to pull the bug out.

Mr Helmer said: “Near the 10-minute mark…he started to stop burrowing but he was still in the throes of death-twitching.

“They said they had never pulled an insect this large out of someone’s ear.”

Despite his ordeal, Mr Helmer, who is not expected to suffer any long-term affects from the incident, said that he would not take any precautions or change his sleeping habit in the future.

He even joked on his Facebook page that he had made peace with his unwanted dead tenant, which he now keeps in a medical pot and calls Roger.