A five-year-old boy needed an emergency operation after swallowing 52 toy magnetic balls. Jude Foley, described as an active little boy, started suffering with sickness bugs last August which were initially brushed off by doctors as nothing serious.
However, the pains in his stomach worsened to the point where his mother Lyndsey decided to take him to A&E at Prince Charles Hospital in Merthyr Tydfil. An initial physical and blood examination showed nothing abnormal, but after an X-ray of Jude's stomach was carried out a necklace-type shape could clearly be seen.
It transpired that Jude had 52 magnetic balls - which can be stacked together to form different structures - stuck in the shape of a ring in his bowel. He was then transferred by ambulance from Prince Charles to the Noah's Ark Children's Hospital of Wales in Cardiff where he underwent a major operation in an attempt to remove them all safely.
