A PET owner whose Pug Penny lived up to her name by swallowing £1.03 in loose change has praised a Surrey veterinary practice for saving her dog’s life.
The usually lively pet was taken to Alfold Vets in Surrey, which is part of VetPartners, when she became subdued and went off her food.
As five-year-old Penny has a cleft palate, her owner Vanessa Rustom initially suspected that a piece of food had become lodged in the permanent opening in the roof of her mouth. However, when Penny was examined at the practice on Loxwood Road in Alfold, vet Alex Chester became concerned that there could be something more serious behind her symptoms. With Vanessa’s permission, Alex carried out X-rays to investigate further.
The X-rays revealed a stack of mystery round objects inside Penny’s stomach and Alex performed emergency surgery to remove them. She says the one-pound coin and three pennies she found inside Penny are among the most unusual objects she’s ever surgically removed from a pet.
Alex said: “When we saw the objects on the X-ray, our vet nurses and myself were quite taken aback and couldn’t work out exactly what they were. We knew it must be something metal due to their appearance on X-ray, and thought maybe it was a plug for something or small, round magnets. When I took out the coins, it was a real eureka moment.
“The coins were still in Penny’s stomach, so she had probably only swallowed them a few hours before, but if we hadn’t discovered and removed them, they could have made her really poorly. If the coins had stayed in the stomach, they could have caused ulcers, and if they’d moved along into her intestines it’s likely they would have caused a blockage and some nasty damage along the way. She’s only a small dog and the coins could easily have got stuck, and that would have made her very ill very quickly.”
Following her surgery, Penny spent two nights being monitored round-the-clock at Farnham Veterinary Hospital as pets with a cleft palate can be more sensitive to the effects of anaesthetic. Since then, she has returned to Alfold Vets for regular check-ups to ensure her wound was healing correctly.
Alex added: “Penny has made a great recovery and I’m really pleased with the outcome. It was very rewarding to be able to work out what was wrong with her and to help her feel better.”
Penny is now back home in Horsham with Vanessa, who rescued Penny when she was eight months old. As a puppy, Penny needed hand feeding due to her cleft palate, and underwent surgery to try and repair the hole in her mouth but it wasn’t possible to close it completely.
Vanessa said: “It was so worrying when Penny was unwell and I’m very grateful to Alex and the team at Alfold Vets for being so thorough and finding out what was wrong with her. The whole team was brilliant and gave her the best care and thanks to them Penny is back to her usual, bouncy self.
“We do try to stay as vigilant as possible with Penny because she has a habit of picking things up. I have no idea where she found the money, though, as the only place we might have coins is in the children’s bedrooms but Penny doesn’t go in there. I can only think she found them outside, perhaps in Horsham Park or around the town centre, where we walk quite often.”
Alfold Vets is a small, friendly veterinary practice that has been delivering the highest levels of care to pets in Surrey and West Sussex for 22 years. Its dedicated team offers a range of health checks and preventative treatments for small animals, as well as surgical procedures and physiotherapy.