A grieving dog owner has filed a lawsuit against a vet after a botched operation allegedly left a surgical instrument inside her pet's stomach.
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Kristen Breton from Rhode Island brought her dog, Princess Freckles, to Rhode Island Animal Medical Center in August 2022. The St Bernard puppy was booked in for a routine stomach operation and to be spayed.
According to a report by WPRI, Breton took her dog to a vet which was different from her usual, but the procedure seemed to go well.
Princess Freckles occasionally vomited after the procedure, and her condition rapidly deteriorated in Spring 2024. Breton explains in an interview that she took her dog to an emergency veterinary practice in May. When the vets gave Princess Freckles an X-ray, they made a horrific discovery.
The X-ray reveals what appears to be a pair of scissors lodged inside Princess Freckles' abdomen. Breton says, "We were all looking at the X-ray like, it's not possible that there are scissors in my dog's stomach."
Tragically, Princess Freckles's condition had deteriorated so rapidly that she likely wouldn't have survived emergency surgery. At this point, Breton made the tough decision to put her dog down.
According to WPRI, a necropsy confirmed examiners found a pair of surgical scissors and gauze inside Princess Freckles' abdomen. Breton has since filed a lawsuit against Dr. Deborah Hirschmann, who performed the surgery in 2022.
The Breton Family Has An Uphill Legal Battle Against The Vet
While it may sound like the Bretons have an easy case against the veterinary surgeon, their attorney explains that's not true. In a phone interview with People, Marshall M. Raucci explains, "The law is truly not on our side because the law hasn't caught up to where we are as a society."
"A lot of what this case is about is giving a voice to the voiceless because there's no one who has less of a voice than a nonverbal patient like a dog, who can't say if the pain they are experiencing is more serious than a normal sickness."
Raucci adds, " I took the case knowing that the law is decidedly not with us."
According to WPRI, Dr. Hirschmann's attorney, Lauri Christensen, says her client performs hundreds of similar surgeries yearly and has practiced for 18 years. Christensen describes the incident as "a single very regrettable oversight." The report concludes that Hirschmann's license is on active probation for two years, and she can continue to practice during that time.
