Of all the foreign bodies occurring in the respiratory and upper digestive tracts, the commonest form is the disk. Of a total of 213 foreign bodies removed at the bronchoscopic clinic of the Eye and Ear Hospital of Los Angeles, 47, or 22 per cent, were disk-shaped. These were divided in the following order: 15 pennies, or 28 per cent; 12 nickels, or 27 per cent; 1 quarter; 1 half dollar; 6 metal slugs from electrical fuse boxes, or 15 per cent; 1 Chinese coin; 1 advertising token; 1 washer; 1 Mah Jong counter; 1 roofing disk; 1 lead disk; 5 buttons and a brass disk which was part of a toy whistle. With one exception, all of these disks were arrested in the esophagus; the exception, being only half a button and therefore not a complete disk, was removed from the respiratory tract.
The smallest disks were the pennies.