The medical literature is often dry and boring — some might even say clinical — but one study in the BJU International caught my eye today:

Gunshot wounds to the scrotum: a large single-institutional 20-year experience

That single institution was Temple University in Philadelphia, a city that is no stranger to gunshots.

So, how many men were shot in the balls over the course of 20 years?

97.

That’s about five per year, and those are of course only the ones who showed up to Temple.

Apparently, however, Temple is the place to go if you’re shot in the nether regions, according to an editorial accompanying the study:

This 20-year series of scrotal gunshot wounds reflects this centre’ s excellent past work in gunshot injury to the penis [1] and kidney [2].

Surgeons ended up removing about half of the testicles injured by scrotal gunshot wounds.

The pictures accompanying the study are quite something. Let’s just say that maybe it’s a good thing some papers aren’t open-access.

Update: On my Facebook page, Arnon Krongrad demonstrates that this study might have implications for a murder trial in India.