Kristen Saunders said her daughter accidentally ate the bristle from a BBQ cleaning brush tucked inside the sandwich (Picture: Kristen Saunders)
A girl, 9, had to undergo life-saving surgery after eating a bacon and egg roll.
The youngster had been ‘munching away’ on the sandwich when she accidentally ingested a wire bristle from a barbecue brush in New South Wales, Australia.
Used to clean grill grates, the bristles have long been a headache for health officials as the sharp wires can snap off and be unintentionally ingested.
Mum Kristen Saunders said the July incident led to a month-long hospital stay for her daughter as the bristle jabbed her oesophagus.
The strand of the cleaning tool then pushed into the carotid artery – a major blood vessel that provides the brain’s blood supply – in her neck.
Saunders told ABC Newcastle Breakfast: ‘She was munching away, then she started to feel like she was choking.’
The sharp wire became wedged inside the youngster (Picture: Kristen Saunders)
The bristles have long been a worry for health experts and officials (Picture: Kristen Saunders)
The mum said that her daughter seemed fine at first – even competing in a school athletics carnival not long after – though struggled to eat solid foods and had a sore throat.
But her condition spiralled within days, with the family taking the girl to the John Hunter Hospital in Newcastle at the advice of their GP.
By then, the daughter was disoriented and couldn’t recognise her own loved ones.
‘They identified that there were some abscesses in the brain,’ Saunders said, adding she was then taken to Westmead Children’s Hospital in Sydney.
The girl’s arteries had become infected and needed to be ‘replaced’, she added, in a risky operation that thankfully went without a hitch.
‘She actually had a phenomenal recovery, considering what it could have looked like and how it could have ended up, and she’s doing really well now,’ the mum said.
The young girl was eventually flown to another hospital for surgery (Picture: Kristen Saunders)
The young girl has since recovered (Picture: Kristen Saunders)
Her daughter is now on a course of antibiotics and is back at school.
Researchers have described BBQ wire brushes as an ‘underrecognized and difficult-to-manage hazard’.
If swallowed, the tiny bristles can get stuck in the throat and, if left untreated, end up in vital body parts such as the intestines.
Around 1,700 people in the US ended up in emergency wards from 2002 to 2014 due to BBQ brush-bristle-related incidents, or about 140 cases per year, according to a 2016 study published in the Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery journal.
Among the cases, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said people experienced neck punctures which resulted in pain when swallowing as well as pricks to their gastrointestinal tract, requiring emergency surgery.
The agency said in 2012: ‘Awareness among the public, manufacturers who make wire grill-cleaning brushes, and retailers who sell these products can reduce exposures and decrease the likelihood of further occurrences.
‘Before cooking, persons should examine the grill surface carefully for the presence of bristles that might have dislodged from the grill brush and could embed in cooked food.
‘Alternative residential grill-cleaning methods or products might be considered.’
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‘She was munching away, then she started to feel like she was choking.’