A quick-thinking vet saves the local cat after a thorn stuck in its eye

A cat had a narrow escape after a 2cm long stick pierced its eye while it was playing in a tree. Two-year-old feline Oberon was rushed to the vet by his worried owner Rachel Wilkes when he returned home with a sharp thorn stuck in his eyeball.

Staff at Willows Veterinary Center and Referral Service in Solihull, West Midlands, immediately took Oberon in for emergency surgery as he was at risk of losing his sight. Following a delicate operation to remove the stick, they were able to save his sight and the short-haired domestic cat has since made a full recovery.

Rachel, from Hockley Heath, West Midlands, said: “Oberon came in with one of his eyes closed and what looked like a piece of wood sticking out of his head, just above the eye. When I tried to pull the stick, I realized. it was stuck in Oberon’s eye, so he knew he needed to see an emergency vet. It was a Sunday evening so I was happy to have Willows practically on my doorstep. I was still in shock when the vet said that the thorn was buried deep in Oberon’s eye and was left wondering how it happened and worried that there was a possibility that he might lose his eye. However, the vet was very reassuring and gave me the option of trying to save Oberon’s eye, although with no guarantees as it was impossible to save. measure the impact of the injury until he was under anesthesia.”

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Oberon entered with one of his eyes closed and what looked like a piece of wood sticking out of his head, just above the eye.

“I wanted to give them every chance to save their sight and keep their eyes, and the results were just amazing. Everyone at Willows was so nice and caring to us and Oberon.

“The eye team worked late into the night on Sunday to make sure he was operated on straight away and I felt 100 per cent confident they would do everything possible for him. They really did. Now he’s fully recovered, he’s been out climbing trees again and he’s back to his old energetic self.”

“They even gave me the thorn in a pot afterwards as a souvenir because they were so surprised at its size.”

Alberto Palella Gomez, a veterinary specialist in ophthalmology who performed the procedure, said it was a race against time to repair the damage.

He said: “An eye examination confirmed a penetrating injury from a 2cm stick which had punctured Oberon’s cornea and was inserted deep into his left eye. The injury caused severe inflammation and increased pressure in the eye and without prompt surgery Oberon would have lost the injured eye as a result of this ocular hypertension.

“He was very lucky, though. An ultrasound scan showed the stick stopped just short of his lens, which was a lucky escape. This meant we had to have corneal surgery to repair the damage.

“If the foreign body had perforated the lens, cataract surgery would also have been necessary. Oberon was taken to theater to remove the foreign body and repair the injury with a corneal graft.”

Oberon entered with one of his eyes closed and what looked like a piece of wood sticking out of his head, just above the eye.

“He recovered well from anesthesia, and the pressure inside the eye normalized immediately after surgery, and in the weeks after surgery, the corneal graft integrated well into the cornea.”

“The happy result was that Oberon not only kept his left eye but also retained excellent vision and we were delighted to release him two months after the operation, none the worse for his accident.”

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