Owner Becka Johnson rushed one-year-old Smudge to the vet when she noticed the cat becoming drowsy and a paracetamol tablet missing at her home in Poole.

But the antidote was unavailable in all local practices, and Ms Johnson was told to drive to Poole Hospital.

Doctors there were able to give her the necessary drug to take back to a vet.

Caty Swain, of the Companion Care Poole vet surgery, which treated Smudge, said she had immediately recognised the signs of poisoning when she saw Smudge's nose and gums were bright blue.

But when the practice did not have the antidote drug in stock, she rang around other vets in the region but none was available.

"We see a surprising number of poison cases, and this isn't the first case involving a paracetamol tablet that I've had to deal with," she said.

"Sadly, some cats who have helped themselves to tablets haven't been as lucky as Smudge.

"We are all so grateful that Poole Hospital had the antidote in stock, without it Smudge would certainly not have made it through."

Ms Johnson said Smudge was her family's first pet.

"In the year we have had her she has kept us on our toes, both with her entertaining antics and relatively regular visits to the vet for one thing or another, but the paracetamol poisoning exceeds anything we could have imagined," she said.

She said the hospital had sent the bill for the drug to the vet, which she had then paid.(BBC News)