Dog Choking

Dog Choking on Bone:  Help!

If your dog is choking on a bone right now, the first thing to do is to see if you can remove the chew that’s caught in the throat.  A flashlight may help you to see.  Try to reach in a pull the obstruction out. A source with good instructions on dog choking emergencies is available here: https://www.petguide.com/health/dog/how-to-perform-the-dog-heimlich-maneuver/.  The choking-dog-help methods work for all kinds of chews (bone, rawhide, bully stick, pig ear, etc.).

Our Story of Choking on Chews

Many dog owners find that their dog keeps choking on bones and chews. SafetyChew was invented because of a choking problem with my dog Eva. When she was almost done with a bully stick or rawhides, and someone would walk into the room, she would gulp down the stub portion. Twice she was make a horrible gagging sound where she was actually choking but still breathing. Those two times I had to reach into her mouth and pull the chew bone out of her throat. We banned chews in our house because of these choking dog events. But since chews are a great treat for my pooch, and they keep her busy (occupied for a little while at least), I decided to invent the world’s greatest safe dog chew holder: SafetyChew. If you want the best dog choke preventing product, then you need to buy SafetyChew.   And SafetyChew is even safer because it’s made in USA!     

Dog Choking Research

There’s quite a bit of scientific research into dogs choking on bones, chews, and other objects.  Because while chews are healthy and enjoyable for dogs, there are lots of examples that the final portion of the dog chew may be hazardous. The dog can choke on the final portion if it is small enough to swallow yet large enough to become lodged in the esophagus. In “Esophageal Foreign Bodies in Dogs: 34 cases (2004–2009)” [Journal of Veterinary Emergency and Critical Care 22(2) 2012, pp 253–261. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1476-4431.2011.00700.x], of the objects removed from dogs by vets, 30% were rawhide and 30% were bones.  These numbers make sense because these two types of dog chews are the two most popular types.

This paper is also interesting because they describe the how long it took for the owner to take the dog to the vet clinic. The shortest time for an owner to get to the clinic for choking help was just 30 minutes.  But the average time was still under 3 hours from when the choking began.  The longest time the owner admitted to taking was 120 hours.  That’s 5 days from when the dog started choking before the owner took the dog to the vet. This time is excessive.  

Vet Costs

If your dog does choke on a dog chew bone, it can be very expensive to fix. Many times dogs are able to cough up a choking chew. But when they can’t, or they swallow it and it plugs up their digestive system, a trip to the vet is in order. The graphic at right gives an overview of just how expensive a trip can be (https://www.veterinarypracticenews.com/bizarre-meals-cost-pet-owners-plenty-in-vet-bills/). Instead you can buy SafetyChew, and these costs can be avoided.

Dog Choking Sounds

Anyone who has ever heard the sound of a dog gagging on a bone will never forget it. The dog choking sound is very recognizable. But just in case, a very memorable choking dog sound comes from a great holiday classic. But for this clip, we not only get the choking sound effect, we also get the final bonus sound of the dog’s meal coming up. “He’s just yakking on a bone”.