A young Rottweiler who swallowed a plastic spring has bounced back to health thanks to expert care at Blacks Vets in Dudley.
Dramatic images show the spring lodged deep in two-year-old Rosie’s stomach but, incredibly, the award-winning team at Blacks Vets in Dudley managed to remove it without resorting to surgery.
Clinical director Brian Hogan quickly sprang into action when Rosie arrived at the hospital showing signs of lameness and a high temperature.
Brian admitted discovering the spring came as a complete surprise, saying: “It was an incidental find which was captured by the x-rays as we investigated Rosie’s lameness.
“When we discussed it with the owner, she remembered that her cat was playing with a toy four weeks earlier and Rosie appeared to grab and swallow it.
“She said they’d monitored her closely afterwards but Rosie didn’t pass anything and appeared well.
“That’s not unusual. Many patients can remain very well, however, if the object moves from the stomach to the small intestine, it could then cause a serious blockage so we needed to remove it.
“The spring was plastic, so we hoped to retrieve it using an endosope without causing significant trauma to Rosie’s oesophagus. If that failed, she would have required surgery to remove the spring.
“It was a tricky procedure which took around 15 minutes. The challenge was that the tool designed to grip and remove the spring must fit through a very narrow channel within the endoscope and is, therefore, quite delicate.
“We were concerned it may not be robust enough to maintain a strong enough grip as we squeezed the spring back up through the oesophagus.
“We worked as a team to slowly and carefully inch it up from her stomach, into her mouth and finally removed it successfully.
“I was assisted by the anaesthetist and a vet nurse to control the endoscope and the grasping tool, and everything went well and we succeeded with very little trauma to Rosie.”
Relieved owner Claire McConnell, from Dudley, was full of praise for Brian and the Blacks Vets team afterwards.
Claire explained: “I knew instantly what it was when the vet called me to say a foreign body had been found in her stomach.
“I was still surprised and shocked, though, as it had been at least four weeks since she had swallowed it.
“I had regularly checked to see if it had come out the other end for about a week after she swallowed it but nothing – and then I thought that perhaps she hadn’t swallowed it after all.
“When it showed up on the X-ray I was very concerned and knew if they couldn’t remove it via her mouth then she would have to have an operation to remove it.
“Thankfully, everything went well, and Rosie is doing so much better now and is back to her loveable, bouncy, crazy self.
“She was looked after very well by all the staff at Blacks, and I was kept informed at every stage of her treatment.
“I have been a client of Blacks for 24 years now and I wouldn’t take my pets anywhere else and I have recommended them to many of my friends and family over the years.”
Find out more about our emergency care at our Dudley Hospital
