We had an extraordinary case recently. Pudding the cat had a wound on his face near his ear.
Eve our vet thought it looked suspicious and so she gave him some sedation and xrayed him, see below.
Appallingly, Pudding had been shot with an air gun pellet. This is something we do see depressingly frequently.
Honestly, why would this happen? What possible reason could there be to do this?
From a medical perspective, Pudding was actually extremely lucky, believe it or not. A few centimetres either side and the bullet may well have killed him – there are several major vessels/nerves, not to mention his brain very close to where the bullet finally lodged.
We have left it in there which sounds odd. The bullet itself is actually fairly inert and, once Pudding is over the initial infection, it will sit there for ever and shouldn’t cause a problem. It would actually be incredibly difficult to try and remove a bullet positioned such as this – the surgery would be fraught with danger in terms of trying not to damage any of those vital structures that are all nearby.
Thankfully, at the time of writing Pudding has made a full recovery and is back to his normal self!
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