Body packing: a review of general background, clinical and imaging aspects

Abstract

To avoid detection at border crossings or airport customs, drug trafficking is increasingly performed by intra-corporeal concealment. Body packers may ingest packets of varying size and containing varying drugs (mostly cocaine, heroin and cannabis) mixed with other compounds, while body pushers will insert packets in the rectum or vaginal cavity. Body packing may lead to potential life-threatening complications with acute overdose syndromes after packet rupture and intestinal obstruction with possible ensuing bowel rupture being the most significant complications. Physicians including radiologists should be aware of the capabilities of imaging techniques to screen for presence of drug packets as well as the potential complications. Although conventional radiography has long been and still is the most important imaging modality for screening for presence of intestinal packets, the better test characteristics in conjunction with the decreasing radiation exposure, will likely render computed tomography (CT) more important in the future. For imaging of symptomatic patients, CT already is the modality of choice. Besides these modalities, ultrasound and magnetic resonance imaging will be discussed in this paper, together with more general background and clinical information.

An unusual foreign body in the stomach: a package of heroin. Succesfull endoscopic treatment of a

“…Endoscopy was performed and the package was successfully removed. [11] In our case, endoscopic treatment was successful and without complication. Possible complications associated with endoscopic foreign body retrieval include perforation, hemorrhage, foreign body impaction, airway obstruction, and sedoanalgesia-related complications.…”

Imaging of body packing: errors and medico-legal issues

“…Body packing is the concealing of illegal drugs in the abdominal or pelvic cavity of the human body [1,2]. Although the majority of illicit substances are transported around the world by sea, road/train, or air transport in different ways of packaging, concealment within a person's body remains a frequent mode of transportation for lesser quantities.…”

The role of radiology in diagnosis and management of drug mules: an update with new challenges and new diagnostic tools

“…[2][3][4] However, a single person can be both a body packer and body pusher at the same time. 6 A body packer can carry 50-100 packages, each containing 8-10 g of narcotic agents, weighing up to 1 kg in a single transport. 5 However, the number of packages and the amount of drugs can be highly variable, and cases have been reported of individuals carrying more than 200 packages.…”

“…The term body stuffer is used for persons carrying a lesser number of carelessly packed small packages, concealed when coming across security forces (Table 1). 2,5 Drug cartels may also use children [8][9][10] and females who are pregnant 6,11 to draw less attention and are able to pass narcotic drug packages without getting caught.…”