Vet warning after shard lesson for Milo

A vet has urged colleagues to maintain a low threshold for imaging pets after saving the life of a dog that had eaten glass.

Six-year-old golden retriever Milo was presented to The Veterinary Wellness Centre in Musselburgh outside Edinburgh three days after eating from a smashed glass jar of Biscoff spread encountered on a walk.

Milo’s owner removed several visible shards from his mouth at the time, but as he appeared unaffected, he was not taken to the vet until the third day when small shards were noticed in his stool and he vomited a 3cm fragment.

Although the dog continued to appear clinically normal upon presentation, abdominal radiographs revealed a 6cm long glass shard, prompting an emergency exploratory laparotomy and gastrotomy.

Removed intact

The shard was successfully removed intact; the stomach wall was found to be clear of any additional fragments or mucosal lacerations before closure and Milo is said to have made an uneventful recovery.

Vet James Gray, who treated Milo, urged clinicians to issue proactive advice to clients to keep dogs on lead around discarded litter and food waste, particularly those that are food motivated.

He continued: “Without imaging this may not have been identified until clinical deterioration occurred, at which point the risk of perforation and septic peritonitis would have been considerably higher.

“Unlike many foreign bodies, glass fragments can pass through the gastrointestinal tract without causing obvious signs in some cases, while in others they cause silent, ongoing mucosal trauma.

“The unpredictability of clinical progression argues for a low threshold for radiography in any patient with a witnessed or suspected ingestion of glass, even in the apparent absence of clinical signs.”