Donkey undergoes life-saving surgery in Yorkshire to fit him with pacemaker

The five-hour operation to implant the pacemaker into Prince Buttons was performed at Rainbow Equine Hospital in Malton, and he’s believed to be one of just a handful of donkeys in the world to have undergone the procedure.

His worried owner Denise Hart, from East Yorkshire, contacted the hospital’s veterinary team when she noticed the five-year-old miniature donkey was having episodes where he would stagger and then collapse.

After carrying out tests vet Gemma Tyner diagnosed a potentially fatal heart condition called bradycardia, which is a very slow and irregular heartbeat.

Gemma said Buttons’ heart would block – not function normally – repeatedly for up to 24 seconds at a time.

She said: “Buttons’ condition was very serious and that is a very long time to go without a normal heartbeat. Unfortunately, it’s not something that can be managed with medication and, euthanasia had to be considered.

“However, I was able to tell his owner the good news that there was an option to save his life, which was fitting a pacemaker.”

With this procedure being extremely rare in the equine world, Gemma worked with Celia Marr, a specialist in internal medicine at Rossdales Veterinary Surgeons in Newmarket, and small animal surgeons Dr Chris Linney and Dr Julie Kavanagh from Paragon Veterinary Referrals in Wakefield.

During the procedure, the pacemaker, which is the size of a large box of matches, was inserted into a pocket in Buttons’ neck and wires connected to his heart.