WARNING! Zinc poisoning in dogs!

Doberluv

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#1
(from a horse magazine)


We heard from a reader that her one year old dog started falling over and acting sick. She took him to the vet, and it turned out he had eaten four pennies and a quarter at some time in his short life. The vet could not get the coins to pass through the stomach, so he ended up doing surgery to remove them.

U.S. pennies minted after 1982 have a copper coating around a zinc core, and contain roughly 2,440mg. of elemental zinc. One penny can cause zinc poisoning in animals. The vet explained that the smell of zinc seems to attract dogs. This particular dog had gotten on a dresser and picked out the coins containing zinc.

The zinc was breaking down in the gut and causing zinc poisoning. The red blood cells were exploding. The dog was suffering from anemia and the vet gave him some compound to help with couteracting the zinc. The had to do a blood transfusion and the bill was above $2,000.

Zinc posoning can also cause vomiting, diarrhea, jaundice, weight loss, anemia, seizures, and kidney failure. It's amazing that a simple thing like a penny can be so harmful. Be sure to tell yourkids to keep those pennies off the floor where the dog can't eat them.
 

Purr

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#2
Geez! I always knew pennies were evil.....Dang. I'm glad I always get to the pennies before the dogs....thanks Carrie, that's really good to know.
 

nedim

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#3
Thanks for sharing, I bet you've saved someone a lot of future heartache.
 

Husky626

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#9
Thanks for sharing. Now I know to keep any coins away from dog. We have a big piggy bank in his room, gotta remove that! It sucks that it only cost 4 pennies and a quarter that turned into a $2000 bill.
 

keyodie

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#10
Wow. That's kinda sad. I'll be sure to keep a lookout for some loose pennies lying on the floor. Out of curiousity, are other animals attracted to zinc? (Like cats?)
 
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villiger2

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#12
hey i think on the main page u should have a topic IMPORTANT HEALTH NOTICES or something it would be much easier than having to look thorou all the sections
 

Colleen

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#13
Zinc Poisoning in my puppy

I have a 19 month old Pomeranian that has had surgery (2) times in the past 6 months for eating coins. The first time was in July, my puppy started with loss of appetite and then she starting taking seisures. She became very week and after many trips to the Vet we went to a animal hospital, they admitted her for 3 days and on the second day they did a X Ray. That is when the found the coins and operated, she swallowed a penny, nickel and a dime. After removing the coins she need 2 blood transfusions because the zinc attacked the red blood cells that incident was a total of $2800.00. She recovered with no side effects. The day after Thanksgiving she started to take seisures again, we knew right away and immediately took her to the vet, he did a XRay right away and sure enough there was another foreign body. Her red blood count was dangerously low so we had to go directly to the animal hospital. They did surgery that day and fought a penny that was 2/3 rds digested. The hospital had to do another transfusion. This time we needed to check her Lead and Zinc Levels, very costly. We also take her 2 times a week to her regular vet to check her blood levels. The lead levels came back within normal limits, however the Zinc level is off the charts. We repeated the Zinc test on friday with the hope that the level has come down since the first test which was done four days after surgury. This time our cost is currently at $3900.00. There is alot of people that think we are crazy for spending what we have on our puppy when I also have 4 children, but what do you do, she is just as much part of our family and we love her like one of the children. When the zinc results come back, if they are still dangerously high, we need treat her with some procedure that I do not know anything about to bind the zinc in her body. This has really been a experience like you can't imagine. Who would ever think that a penny can do so much damage.
 
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#15
My pup swallowed a penny a couple of months ago. I never saw it pass (not saying it didn't). How long would it take before she showed any signs of zinc poisoning? Does anybody know? Now I'm worried.

Pam
 

carlar

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#19
I never knew that, thanks for posting about it. I will be sure to keep my pennies and nickels off the floor for sure now.
 

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