Need Help?

Curiosity didn’t kill this kitten but it did get her into a tight squeeze

Emergency vets and vet nurses come to the rescue of kitten stuck in toy

A kitten had to be rushed to the vets – when she got her head stuck inside the hole of a children’s shape-sorting toy.

The owner reckons her toddler, Harley, encouraged the kitten to climb into the musical gadget after she’d taken her eye off him for a few moments.

It seems two-year-old Harley had got fed up playing with the cylinders, cubes and tetrahedrons that come with the toy.

Donna, 31, said: “I keep telling my son Harley not to touch the cats, but he loves playing with the kittens. He has a habit of trying to put them in odd places.

“Harley had been playing one evening and my 11-year-old daughter Amy heard a miaow and went to check on him. It was then we saw the toy with the kitten sticking out I just thought: ‘How the hell did you get in there’.”

Does you cat need emergency treatment out of hours?

Find your nearest clinic for immediate treatment.

Image of a kitten stuck in a children's toy for Vets Now article
The kitten was found with its head stuck a children's toy

Donna dabbed a bit of Vaseline on to the kitten’s neck and head in a bid to get her out of the square hole of the plastic toy, but could not push her through.

She added: “The kitten has a tiny head so I didn’t think it would be a problem, but as soon as I got towards her ears she started screaming. It was then I realised it wasn’t working for me. I’m quite soft so anything like that upsets me.”

Donna, who lives in Sittingbourne, Kent, then took the kitten, who is still to be named, to a neighbour who offered to cut the musical toy in half, but Donna decided against that for fear of hurting her.

Instead, she drove to the Vets Now clinic in Gillingham. It provides out-of-hours emergency care for pets in the area, including PDSA clients such as Donna.

Veterinary staff were able to free the stricken kitten from the toy and, thankfully, she emerged unscathed.

The trip to Vets Now proved to have another benefit as veterinary nurse Victoria Mansfield discovered that the kitten was dangerously anaemic.

Victoria said: “We anaesthetised the kitten and with a bit of handy manoeuvring she was out, up and eating. This is not a scenario we come across every day so it was a real talking point. We’re pleased we could help.

“We were also able to spot that she had a dangerously low red blood cell count due to anaemia and we gave some help with that too.”

Donna and her family were grateful for the help with the kitten and relieved that the anaemia had been spotted.

“It was a bit upsetting for us all to see the kitten stuck like that, but hopefully I can stop Harley from getting up to any more tricks with them before they go to their new homes in a few weeks,” she said.

The pet emergency clinic in Gillingham – where the kitten received treatment – is one of a nationwide network of Vets Now clinics and hospitals that are open through the night, seven-days-a-week, and day and night on weekends and bank holidays, to treat any pet emergencies that may occur.

All of Vets Now’s out-of-hours clinics and 24/7 hospitals have a vet and vet nurse on site at all times.