Siu Yo – A cat swallowed the string

On 25/10/20 Siu Yo a 5 year old female cat was presented to our Ma On Shan hospital after the owner found string hanging from her bottom.

The owner had tried to gently pull the string, but it seemed to be stuck firmly.

The owner was clever enough not to pull too hard. It was clear that this was a potentially bad situation.

We told the owners that there was nothing that could be done, except do the surgery to remove the string from wherever it was stuck.

The owners were not too pleased to hear this news, but they realised that they had no choice. So, 2 hours after being first seen, Siu Yo duly had an anaesthetic and we did a surgery at her abdomen.

It was then very obvious that the string had got stuck quite close to the stomach and went all the way down to the anus. To get the string out we had to cut open the intestines in three places and extract the string in segments.

The surgery went very well and Siu Yo went home the following day. We removed the stitches 13 days later and Siu Yo was looking very good.

The string was relatively thick and did not cut through the intestine as quickly as thinner string would have done. The owners recognised the problem quickly, they did not pull on the string too much and they agreed to do the surgery without any delays.