Babies and batteries

A 6-week-old girl was admitted in October, 2003, with respiratory distress and feeding problems. We examined her, did blood tests and a chest radiograph, and gave her antibiotics. We failed at several attempts to pass a nasogastric tube. 24 h later, she was in respiratory failure, and we transferred her to intensive care, where she was intubated and ventilated. A second radiograph (figure, A) showed two foreign bodies in the oesophagus, that we had assumed were electrocardiography pads on the radiograph taken at admission.