Hospital saves girl who drank toxic fat remover
07/08/2012 03:55
Kaplan Medical Center in Rehovot warned parents that they should never transfer cleaning fluids to “innocent-looking bottles."
Cooking oil Photo: Courtesy
The school vacation began only a few days ago, and already a seven-old-girl
drank a glass of industrial fat remover that had been stored in a mineral water
bottle in the home and poured a cup for her cousin.
The girl immediately
suffered significant chemical burns in her esophagus and stomach, but she
managed to stop her cousin from drinking his cup of poison when she realized it
was not juice.
Kaplan Medical Center in Rehovot warned parents on
Thursday that they should never transfer cleaning fluids to “innocent-looking
bottles.
The damage that is liable to happen could endanger life, and the
amount of suffering is huge.”
The girl, who lives in the South, was
rushed to Kaplan after swallowing the liquid fat remover and admitted a week ago
in serious condition.
She underwent a gastroscopy that showed serious
internal chemical burns.
She was hospitalized in the pediatric intensive
care unit, where a food tube was connected directly to her stomach so she could
receive food and water for two weeks without it going through her damaged
esophagus. Under this care, she improved and was out of danger. She was
fortunate that the acidic material had not burned a hole in her
esophagus.
The girl’s mother said the girl was with her brother at her
aunt’s home and went to the kitchen to take a drink.
She and her little
cousin saw a bottle of “mineral water” containing a material the color of
diluted raspberry syrup. She poured it into two cups and started to drink it but
noticed a terrible taste.
Her cousin almost drank it as well, but she
managed to prevent him from doing so.
Dr. Michal Korey, head of the
pediatric gastroenterology unit at Kaplan said fat remover is extremely
poisonous and can kill. “The girl arrived with burns on her mouth and stomach
pains.”
Treatment was carried out under general anesthesia.
Such
accidents can be prevented entirely by locking cleaning products and other
chemicals and keeping them out of the reach of children.
If such an event
occurs, the child must be taken immediately to a hospital emergency
room.
Now the child is attached to a food tube, said the mother, “and we
feel we are in safe hands,” her mother said.