When the summer comes around, we love nothing more than getting the barbecue out for a family feast. If this American mother’s story is anything to go by, however, we need to be very careful with the equipment we use.
Jenna Kuchik got in touch with the Love What Matters Facebook page to share an important warning, after a frightening hospital dash with her son, Ollie.
Recounting the past ‘scary’ 24 hours, Jenna urged all those reading: “Please, please, please EVERYONE; do not use a metal BBQ brush!”
“Just minutes after eating BBQ chicken last night, Ollie started crying and complaining there was something stuck in his throat.”
Jenna suspected that it may have been a bristle that had broken off of the metal barbecue brush they were using to cook the food. A little investigation confirmed their fears, with Jenna’s husband Matt discovering a stray bristle in another piece of chicken they had not yet eaten.
Little Ollie was rushed to hospital, where ‘an x-ray confirmed a few hours later that there was indeed a metal BBQ brush bristle in her little boy’s throat’.
During his two-hour stay at the hospital, Ollie was unable to swallow, and ‘kept gagging and spitting’.
On account of the location of the metal bristle, Ollie had to be transferred to another hospital, where a specialist team worked to remove it.
A traumatised Jenna explained that the accident ‘could have been 100 per cent avoidable’.
“We even have a wooden BBQ grill cleaner still new in package that we’ve been meaning to use,” she explained.
“It wasn’t until 5pm today that he finally got two pieces of metal bristles removed from his throat in the OR.
“He was such an amazing, strong, brave boy…and I am so grateful he is OK, but I just don’t ever want something like this to happen to someone else.”
Jenna’s post has gone viral, with many parents taking to the comment section to thank her for sharing her warning.
Others added stories of their own, with one woman writing: “I’ve also seen a story of it lodging in a young man’s bowels, and the food piled up on there, and he went septic and almost died….All from a BBQ brush.”
We have never heard of this happening before, but we will certainly be picking up a wooden brush before throwing our next garden party.
