Benny the Ring Thief

Benny: The Ring Thief

We all know that horrible feeling when we've just realized we lost something very important or valuable. This is what happened with Benny's family one evening. A family heirloom wedding ring, which was previously located on his mom's finger, went missing and the family started going through all the places it could be. After a thorough search, they determined that poor Benny likely swallowed the ring when he was getting his evening medications.

The family tried to induce vomiting at home with no success and called Alpine Animal Clinic's emergency line to figure out what to do next. We decided that it would be best to have Benny come in for radiographs to see if he was actually the ring thief, and he very clearly was.

He was given an injection of a medication to cause vomiting and despite a good effort, he did not produce the ring. Because of his size and the size of the ring, I felt that he would have a very hard time passing the ring naturally. His owners were prepared for an abdominal explore surgery to retrieve the ring, but we were able to offer a minimally invasive endoscope approach.

Benny was prepped for anesthesia and set up in our surgical suite. Within 15 minutes of anesthesia the ring was recovered with the flexible endoscope and Benny recovered from anesthesia nicely. He was able to go home to his family the next morning. He was allowed to have a normal breakfast, only needed one GI soothing medication afterwards, did not have an abdominal or gastric incision, and did not have any activity or dietary restrictions (except to eat less gold).

Not only does this new technology allow us to retrieve foreign bodies from the esophagus or stomach, but can also be used as a diagnostic tool and for gastrointestinal biopsies. We are truly fortunate to now offer minimally invasive endoscopy.

Dr. Merry