50 Cent braves surgery with the help of stuffed animals ... but is it a publicity stunt?

Looks like rapper 50 Cent could do with a trip to the candy shop.

The 36-year-old tough guy dropped his usual bravado by tweeting pictures of himself surrounded by stuffed animals while in hospital for an undisclosed procedure.

"I'm in the hospital but my gangsta grillz LOST TAPE is done so it will be out on time," he tweeted to his six and a half millions followers.

"I don't want to go into surgery" he added.

The next day, a more positive-thinking Fiddy tweeted, "I'm feeling better today I think I'm gonna get out of the hospital soon. Eminem called me last night I love him that's my boy".

But there's speculation that it might be a publicity stunt to promote his new LP, which he not so subtly spruiked in his tweets, out on Tuesday.

A People magazine source certainly thinks so. Whether it was or wasn't, it worked — we're writing about it!

Hip-hop artist DJ Drama, a collaborator on 50 Cent's The Lost Tape, told XXLMag that the rapper was suffering from a "stomach virus".

"First they wanted to keep it quiet, but he's not a quiet guy," he said. "He should be cool. It's nothing that serious. We still gonna do our promo (scheduled for tomorrow)".

Still, it's a rare sight to see Fiddy, or any rapper for that matter, in a hospital nightie, bling-less.

50 Cent, real name Curtis Jackson, before the op. Image: 50 Cent Twitter

Feeling better. Image: 50 Cent Twitter