I can't afford my vet bills. What should I do?

In My Humble Opinion
21

The vet school actually is a possibility! Thanks to all that suggested it. This is part of an email response from the incredibly awesome lady that fostered her:

VA Tech is about 4 hours away from me and my best friend has an apartment down there until August, so it’s a definite possibility.

I really appreciate all the advice you guys have given. We have the surgical consult at 8:30 a.m. on Friday morning (it’s about an hour away in rush hour traffic) so that’s the soonest I’ll know something. Kalhoun, I may just steal your fundraising idea. We have a huge backyard and a big grill, and it is summer, so that’s a possibility. serenitynow, excellent ideas as well. I make little cute glass magnet things (hairpins and pushpins too) for gifts that are always well received, so I’m thinking about sending out a letter to everyone on my Christmas card list selling a special “Save My Dog” edition set (with obligatory doe eyed pictures, spectrum).

Anyone have any other fundraising or charity ideas?

I want to say again that you all are the absolute best. She had a really, really rough morning today and reading all the posts really helped me a lot.

22

Sometimes in my town people put up flyers on the entrance to the dog park explaining their pet’s emergencies with a phone number to call if anyone wants to donate or knows someone who can help.

23

If you’ve got a post office box at your disposal, perhaps the mods would allow it to be posted here so doggy-lovin Dopers might wing some cash your way?

:cool:

24

phraser - If the vet students aren’t allowed to practice, how will they ever learn? In such an instance, the orthopod might have a student or two assisting. The students may be doing a orthopedics rotation or may have finished their regular schooling and getting extra training for a specialty. I remember my vet orthopedist saying that the week before he did an ACL surgery on my dog he did one for the great dane who belonged to a human orthopedist, and he let the human doc watch the operation.

25

Hey, I’m in NOVA too. I’m more of a cat person, but I wouldn’t want to see anyone have to euthanize their dog because they couldn’t pay for it.

If you really want to do some sort of fund-raising of any sort, I’ll be in on it. Heck, email me and maybe we can work something out on a smaller scale if there are no other people around here who would chip in a few bucks. You know, karma and all.

Good luck.

26

The operative word here is watch. Students may be holding on to retractors during the surgery, but they sure as hell aren’t cutting. They’re still being supervised during spays, for Chrissakes. If the school in question has a surgery or orthopedic residency program, they might get to cut. Residents, however, are not students. They’re DVM’s (VMD’s, depending on where they went to school) and are boarded for general practice on their own already.

27

First, the bad news:

Contrary to gotpasswords suggestion, the local ASPCA isn’t likely to treat the animal. Most animal shelters have far more animals to help than they have funds, and certainly don’t have $3,500 around to help a single animal. Indeed, if they had that money, they’d spend it on a project that could help 100 animals instead.

Our humane society briefly had a program where we helped folks with vet bills. The need for the service was so severe, however, that within a couple months the project was thousands of dollars in the hole, and we had to cut it off. One of the worst parts of my job is when desperate people call me, asking for veterinary help for their pets, and I have to tell them we can’t do anything.

Now for the slightly-good news: The Humane Society of the United States has a web page full of suggestions. Some of them have been mentioned here; others haven’t. Note particularly that you can call your regional HSUS office for more specific ideas.

Now for the slightly better news: United Animal Nations has a program designed specifically for you. I don’t know anything about this organization, whether they’re reliable or not, but I’ve run across references to them several times. They offer a maximum of $100, not a whole lot – but every little bit helps, right?

If you do work with UAN, I’d love to hear how it turns out; I can figure out whether to refer other folks to them.

Best of luck!

Other folks: y’all may want to look into pet insurance. If you adopt from an animal shelter, and if they’re part of the Petfinder network, you may be eligible for ShelterCare insurance. I’ve heard only good things about their program, and the first two months are free. Other pet insurance programs I’ve seen are pretty cheap, ranging from $5 to $30 a month. If you’ve got the funds to spare, it’s probably a good idea to sign up.

As with human health insurance, they’re not going to cover pre-existing conditions: you won’t be able to sign up and immediately be eligible for getting your dog’s hip replaced (otherwise, nobody would sign up at all until there was an injury). But if you sign up now, you can save yourself tons of money in the long run.

Daniel

28

This is going to be tough for me to say… [sub]and I bet you know where this is going to go[/sub]

I love animals greatly. I have more “nice” feelings for good dog or cat than I do about people in general, but I would seriously consider putting your friend down.

I had a cat that had hip surgery (not an entire hip, but a joint or something) and the girl was never the same. She made do, but always had a bad limp and developed arthritis and was in pain a lot. She lived a long time (20 years, 15 more after the operation) but a lot of that time, especially the later years, she was in pain. In hindsight, I loved her dearly but I wonder if I made the right decision. Now, with hindisight, I’m not so sure if I did.

However, that being said, if you can secure the funding and the vet is confident of a full recovery, go for it. My advice would be to see if you could work out a payment plan with the vet.

29

I wouldn’t give up just so soon. My dog was found in a shelter with a broken leg that was never cared for (the vet guessed that it had been like that for over a year). The leg was deformed beyond repair and it was terribly painful for the dog to walk. Yet a wonderful woman who runs an animal rescue saw him and took him in, got him a full amputation of the leg. I adopted him after he had healed up and you know what, he is the happiest creature I have ever met. Dogs can be remarkable in their ability to adapt. He can run and jump and do everything a normal dog can do…and really, he loves life, more so than any other dogs I’ve met. Dogs do just fine with 3 legs (if you ever have to come to that) and they do better when they are missing a back leg than when they are missing a front (like mine is). I don’t know, just don’t give up if you know that your dog is not ready to give up too. It doesn’t sound like you are about to give up anyway! Good luck with all of this…

30

Laurasia (didn’t you used to be Pangaea? :smiley: ) I’m not sure all dogs do well on 3 legs, especially ones with degenerative hip disease. Putting all the usual rear weight onto one hind leg could turn the “good” hip to cottage cheese pretty quickly too. However, I am not a vet, so can’t speak with authority.

31

One thing I noticed that no one’s mentioned yet about CareCredit is that they have special payment plans whereby you can get 3 to 12 months “same as cash” with no finance charges! I use my CareCredit card for all my kitty’s vet visits and I’ve found the most expensive procedures always end up being the ones payable with no interest over time. To me, that’s the best part about CareCredit (which sets them apart from any other regular old credit card)!

From their FAQs…

You can even apply online!

Best of luck to you and your doggie!

32

Eh, in hip dysplasia there’s no “good” hip, there’s just the “not so bad” hip. Sometimes there’s not even that. AFAIK it’s not even really a weight issue like it can be in humans, it’s just a progressive deformity of the joint. Bad genetics rather than trauma, in other words.

As for putting the dog down, bernse’s experiences are not typical. Most animal’s I’ve seen who’ve had orthopedic surgery do very well indeed, and those who don’t are often victims of unforseen complications during surgery or recovery. The first THR I took part in was in a dog who pretty much had no acetabulum at all, and his hip was entirely dislocated (had been for some time, too). A week post-op, he was walking normally on his own (with towel support as a backup), and he’s never looked back. Today he’s a happy, healthy, perfectly normal 4 year old dog.

33

Oh no, I didn’t mean to remove the leg! I just meant to point out that dogs are remarkable at recovery, even when people think they would often times be better off euthanized, and that surgury is often times a very good option. My neighbor just had her dog’s hip replaced earlier this year. She walks her every day and the dog is doing just great. She was quite putoff by the $4,000 vet bill, but swears it was worth every penny.

34

Again, you guys continue to amaze me with your suggestions and researching and whatnot. Thank you all so much. :slight_smile:

Unfortunately, I’ve been away today because my grandfather had a stroke. :frowning: Can this week get any worse?! At least I have my health (knock on wood).

Well, only one more day until we know something for sure. To throw what I know into the discussion… The vet told us that the longer we put surgery off, the worse her “good leg” (relatively speaking) is going to get (as Qadgop stated earlier).

Don’t know about how much the vet students get to participate. A friend’s brother is in the program at Tech, so perhaps I’ll check into that.

gotpasswords, TeleTronOne, I usually feel terrible about “handouts,” but in this case I might be driven to make an exception. Maybe I could start exchanging sexual favors. Just kidding.

DanielWithrow, I checked out United Animal Nation and definitely plan to apply if we have to do surgery. Thank you. Also, like you said, pet insurance is a great idea. One thing to think about though: most of the carriers I looked into didn’t cover hip surgeries–pre-existing or not–because they’re so common in large breeds. I found the dog through petfinder (which I’d highly recommend) and the free two months of insurance was great–shots cost next to nothing!

She has done much better today than the past two days, but she’s heavily medicated and showing a few side effects. She didn’t really eat tonight, but I think her eating schedule is off.

And a little bit of back story about her and why she’s so important to me: In January, I came home one night and noticed a truck sitting almost in front of my house. (I live on a busy street, right near a 90 degree turn, and it’s a weird place for anyone to pull over. There’s no street parking or anything.) Sliceguy wasn’t home, and I just had a weird feeling, so I drove to the 24 hour CVS a few blocks away. The guy in the truck followed me to the store and tried to grab me. I made it to the front counter and they called the police for me. The man fled and we only got a partial plate. When I finally went home that night, I discovered my phone line had been cut. Over the next few days, when I was out or at class, neighbors saw a similar guy in a similar truck cruise slowly past my house or sit in front of it for a minute. Again, they got partial plates, but no full tag. The police told me that even if they caught this guy, all the could do was charge him with “suspicious behavior.” We had been thinking about getting a dog before, but this really pushed us to do it. We looked at lots of dogs, liked her the most, and made a 4 hour round-trip to get her. I liked her because she looks mean and scary as all hell, but she’s just the sweetest thing you’d ever want to meet and is absolutely no trouble at all. She’s been my sanity ever since I got her and it just breaks my heart that I can’t help her now. So anyway, that’s the story behind her. I just thought I should share that.

35

i am a vet student- we learn by watching videos, but as this is quite specialist surgery, if you want to learn it, once you graduate, you apply for a residency or specialist training program. Residents or training specialists get to hold retractors, pass sutures, etc.

Seeing as orthopaedic surgery has to be as clean as possible, they prefer to have as few people in theatre as possible, which is why we would be watching by video link.

If it was a cat, she probably had an excision arthroplasty, a different procedure. A total hip replacement replaces the hip joint, instead of removing it and leaving the muscles to stabilise the joint (which is why E.A. is done only in small animals and THR is needed for anything larger than a small dog). The complication rate is higher IIRC for EA. I’m sorry to hear she didn’t have as good a result as you’d hoped :frowning:

This is indeed the case, especially with large breed dogs (…if there is a good hip ie traumatic injury to one hip or growth deformity to that side only… often both hips need to be done)

Also, just to say that the after care with a total hip replacement is fairly intensive. Although we aren’t allowed to assist in the surgery, we do get involved in the aftercare. Often it can be up to a week in the hospital: the first 24 hours with epidural anaesthesia or morphine continuous-rate-infusion for pain relief, the rest on cage rest, with physical therapy, and after that, sling-supported gentle exercise. YMMV- different surgeons, different care protocols.

36

Everyone keep their collective fingers, toes and paws crossed for us, please; we’re heading out to the surgeon’s office in less than two hours.

I picked up her x-ray from the vet’s office today. I was not prepared for that. It looked just terrible. And she did not have a good day yesterday at all.

phraser, as you’re a vet to be, when they say we need to do this soon, how relative is soon? A week? A month? A few months? I’m sure the surgeon’s schedules are all booked up, but we can’t have a 3-legged dog until August.

37

I hope your pup is going to have a quick recovery. Although most people’s pets have pre-existing conditions, I gave a link to a popular veterinary insurance company so that people who have pets with no problems or new owners who intend to get the best care for their animals can explore the option of getting insurance for their furries. I will be getting a puppy soon and will definitely look around on the net for the best deal on insurance.

38

We saw the surgeon. He said that we have two options:

1)** A Femoral Head Osteotomy (FHO)**. According to him, this a procedure most commonly done to cats and dogs under 40 lbs. He said that in our case, it is a viable alternative because she is a good candidate for it, and because I am home to do agressive rehabilitation with her. The cost of the FHO would be $1,811.87.

  1. Total Hip Replacement. The cost would be $3,862.73.

I am CareCredit approved and can get 3 months interest-free; after that it’s something like 13% APR.

Samantha did very well at the vet today even though they were poking and prodding her. She hasn’t whined too much, but she has been eating so that we can give her the prescription medicine, which makes a big difference. She has drank tons of water today (probably about 25 cups worth). Not sure what that’s about.

I am waiting to hear back from the Humane Society that we got her from. I have applied to United Animal Nations (thanks again DanielWithrow) and HUA, Hearts United for Animals.

Where’s lainaf’s decision making thread when I need it?!

Advice on what to do as far as which procedure is encouraged.

39

Did the surgeon seem to favor one procedure over the other?

Unfortunately, after a little googling on FHO, I found this describing FHO as a “salvage” procedure, typically resulting in limited stability and range of motion. The femoral head (the “ball” part of the hip joint) is cut off and muscles are re-arranged - the result is a “false” joint as there’s no bone to bone contact. Same page says that if FHO fails, you’re at a dead end and not a good candidate for THR. Bear in mind that this particular site is a maker of hip implants.

Another site targets the suitable weight for an FHO as ideally under 30 pounds and up to 40. Again, it’s described as a “salvage” for those that can’t afford a THR.

This site says FHO isn’t used on Rotties because of their weight. Not sure why they singled out Rotties, but they do.

Every page I looked at describes FHO as a salvage. My instincts, if it were my dog, would be to go for FHR. Those interest-free loans from your parents will cover half, and the rest goes on Care Credit. But, obviously, it’s not my finances or my dog. It’s a tough decision, but it’s one that will have a significant impact on Samantha’s (and yours!) life.

40

My cat has had FHO on both of his back legs and, three years after the second, 5 after the first, he’s still doing wonderfully. Jumping around, attacking the dog, etc. But he’s a 10 pound housecat, and the surgeon specifically told us not to let him get any heavier. He also had no socket and very little ball to start with.

I believe the “no interest” term on CareCredit (assuming that’s the same credit program that I used with his surgeries) gets longer the more you spend, so you might be better off charging the whole operation and getting 12 months-no-interest, then paying off the charge with the loans/money raised in other ways.

My instincts say that FHR would be better, but FHO is better than nothing. Eventually, it’s up to you.

-lv