A retired builder has told how his dog potentially saved his leg – by chewing his toe “to the bone” while he was asleep.
David Lindsay was taking a nap on his sofa when his wife’s scream woke him up.
He looked down to find that his seven-month-old bulldog puppy had been nibbling on his foot, so much so that his toe had been fractured and was covered in blood.
However, in a strange turn of events, it turns out Harley the dog was an unlikely hero.
The 64-year-old father-of-five told Wales Online: “I was asleep on the couch when my wife walked in and shouted, ‘Dave, the puppy’s chewing your toe!’
“My puppy had near enough chewed my big toe off.
“It chewed down to the bone and cracked it. But because of all this, I discovered that my foot is completely numb, I can’t feel anything.”
After being rushed to hospital, doctors told him he had lost the feeling in his feet due to two blocked arteries in his legs.
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He was warned if the blood supply was not returned, he risked losing his leg.
Specialists are now seeing if he can have stents fitted that would open up the arteries and allow the blood flow to return to his leg.
David, from Cambridge, added: “You’ve got to laugh about it. He’s done me a favour by chewing my toe.
“So I’m waiting to find out if they can put stents in. I’ll be keeping the dog. I’ll try to keep my toe too, but if not I told the doctor to cut it off and I can take it home for him!”
