Children push button batteries into noses and ears as readily as beads, but a battery is not an inert foreign body. In a moist cavity it generates a current and releases alkali, causing liquefactive necrosis within hours — septal perforation in the nose, canal and tympanic membrane destruction in the ear. It should be removed as an emergency, within hours, not booked for the next list.
- Ask specifically whether a battery could be the foreign body, and look for the double-ring edge on an X-ray.
- Remove a nasal or aural button battery as an emergency, within hours.
- Do not irrigate the ear or instil drops before removal; fluid speeds the chemical injury.
- Review the site after removal for necrosis and arrange follow-up for septal perforation or canal stenosis.
- Treat a swallowed button battery as a separate, even more urgent emergency.
Why it matters
A battery looks like any other foreign body but causes tissue necrosis within hours.
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