A seven-year-old Siamese cat named “Kitty” cashed several of his nine lives in after consuming 14 elastic hair ties, requiring emergency surgery at the MSPCA-Angell earlier this week.
Kitty was admitted on Sunday, after his previous owner found the hair ties missing and noticed he was showing signs of distress. Kitty’s owner had been trying to re-home the cat for quite some time, and decided to surrender him to the MSPCA after the incident.
Dr. Emma-Leigh Pearson of Angell’s Emergency & Critical Care unit performed a delicate two-hour operation on Monday to extract the hair bands from Kitty’s stomach—as well as several that had lodged in his intestines.
“The foreign body [hair ties] had nearly perforated Kitty’s intestine and he could have died if the surgery had been delayed,” Dr. Pearson said.
Dr. Pearson also removed five centimeters of Kitty’s intestines, which had become badly damaged as a result of the hair ties moving through them.
His surgery now behind him, Kitty will recover for several more days before he is placed for adoption. His prognosis is excellent and he is expected to live a full and healthy life.
Kitty has a history of swallowing items that can make him sick and his new owners must take great care in keeping him away from any string-like material. Prospective adopters are asked to contact adoption@mspca.org if they are interested in him.
The MSPCA removes countless non-food material from the bellies of cats and dogs every year, and Kitty’s case underscores the danger of foreign body ingestion. Other potentially dangerous items that must be kept out of reach of cats (and dogs) include sewing needs and thread, yarn, socks, plastic bags, tinsel and garland—and any other items small enough to be consumed by pets.
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