Great Ormond Street Hospital surgeon warns how swallowing a button battery could be lethal - lithium ion battery manufacturers
One of the country's leading pediatric surgeons has warned of the danger of a deadly lithium "button" battery after treating two patients with severe condition after swallowing in recent weeks.
Martin Elliott, head of state service for severe trachea disease at Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH), said he was concerned that hundreds of children could suffer from life every year --
The threat caused by swallowing a small shiny battery.
If you swallow the battery, it will lead to life.
Limit damage to the esophagus.
However, if the negative pole of the battery is in contact with the surface of the fluid, causing electrolysis and releasing sodium hydroxide, also known as caustic soda, they are the most dangerous, it eats through the trachea and the risk of death is high.
Batteries are becoming more and more common in toys and household items, including remote controls.
GOSH's trachea team is concerned that there will be a surge in cases at Christmas, as the number of children sent to hospitals has steadily increased in recent years.
"Parents need to be aware of the risks this Christmas.
The children will be given gifts that will contain more button batteries.
Button batteries are dangerous, so be careful, look at your children and don't let them fiddle with the battery boxes of toys, "said Professor Elliott, who called on battery manufacturers to consider redesigning batteries, make them more difficult to swallow.
He also wants manufacturers to make button battery cases that "do not affect children at all.
In the United States, as many as 6,000 button batteries are replaced each year, but no numbers are recorded here.
He urged parents and Dr. A & E to be vigilant about the risks.
"In the best case, parents see what's going on, a child can get to a & E in two hours and take out the battery, but the consequences of the delay are not just immediate life
Life threatening at the same time
He said.
Professor Elliott's appeal was supported by the Royal Association for accident prevention, which said that "seemingly harmless small batteries can cause serious harm to children ".
One of the two patients Professor Elliott has treated in recent weeks is two-year-
Old Frankie Gibson from Bournemouth
In August, she swallowed a button battery without her parents knowing it, and after that she received intensive care.
The battery was stuck in her esophagus and eroded into her trachea.
When she had difficulty breathing, her parents rushed her to the hospital, but it took the doctors in Poole and Southampton a few days to find out the cause and remove the battery before she turned to GOSH.
Her 38-year-old father, Dion, said he and Frankie's mother, Haley ton, already knew the risks of regular batteries and locked them out, but Frankie managed to flip
Loose fitting on a pair of 3D glasses.
"You are worried about the normal battery, but you will not consider the button battery.
The message I gave my parents was to look at their children and make sure they were safe.
No one knows, "he said.
Frankie endured six.
She had an hour of surgery to fix her trachea, but now the chest is infected.
"She is a suitable little soldier . . . . . . But it doesn't look like we're going home on Christmas.