When you can't afford $12,000 pet surgeries

[Anonymous]

I do have more than $12,000 in savings but I would not spend that amount of money on a pet.

[Anonymous]

We paid 6k for an emergency surgery for our dog. We could not afford it at the time so I put it on a credit card and paid the credit card off over two years. I treated it like a car payment.

I don't regret my decision financially, but I am not sure I made the best decision for the dog in hindsight. The surgery was a lot on him and the recovery was difficult. I know I made the correct decision given the information that I had at the time, but I also feel like I learned a lot about love and pain too. I may or may not make the same decision today.

[Anonymous]

We got pet insurance so we wouldn't have to worry about making exactly this kind of decision. It's paid for itself as our pets have aged.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It really depends on the circumstances. If your dog is only 2 years old and needs a $5,000 surgery, are you really going to consider putting it down?? That's much different than an elderly dog who needs a $5,000 procedure that may or may not improve quality of life.

+1

Outcomes matter, too. We had a kitten growing up who developed a tumor that made it impossible for him to use his back legs. The vet explained that even if we removed the tumor, he probably would not get use of those legs back because of damage to his nerves from both the tumor and the surgery. We had him put to sleep. That seemed like a cruel fate to assign to him, and the vet was in full agreement that it would be a short, hard life.

One thing I learned from that experience, though, is that even short lives are worthwhile. We were very fond of that kitten and loved playing with him, gave him an affectionate name, and I have nice memories of him even though we only had him a couple months and half of that time he was ill. You cannot measure the value of a pet's life in the length of his life. Quality matters much, much more. That's why I'll never do life-saving intervention on a pet unless I know they have a reasonably good chance of living a healthy life after, even if I can afford it.

[Anonymous]

$12K is a lot of cash. A dog I might spend a few thousand, a cat considerably less.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Most dogs don't require insanely expensive surgeries until they are elderly, and at that point most people opt to put them down, understanding that they've lived a good life.

Unless your dog is a purebred from a sketchy breeder who doesn't health test (or a purebred from a rescue, which assumes sketchy breeder), the odds of something like hip dysplasia or an ACL tear in a pet dog is minimal. (This is assuming you are keeping them at a healthy weight and doing a reasonable amount of fitness with them). Most mutts are relatively healthy.

Totally disagree with all of that. I think the pound dogs are the least healthy. Usually they're from puppy mills

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most dogs don't require insanely expensive surgeries until they are elderly, and at that point most people opt to put them down, understanding that they've lived a good life.

Unless your dog is a purebred from a sketchy breeder who doesn't health test (or a purebred from a rescue, which assumes sketchy breeder), the odds of something like hip dysplasia or an ACL tear in a pet dog is minimal. (This is assuming you are keeping them at a healthy weight and doing a reasonable amount of fitness with them). Most mutts are relatively healthy.

Totally disagree with all of that. I think the pound dogs are the least healthy. Usually they're from puppy mills

Right, purebred dogs from a shelter are almost all puppy mill/BYB dogs. Any halfway decent breeder will take back unwanted dogs and prevent them from going to a shelter. Mutts though tend to cancel out genetic predisposition to various issues. E.G. cavaliers are 99% dead by age 10 from heart issues. Cavalier crosses can realistically be expected to live to be 15 or 16. Purebred shepherds are notorious for hip dysplasia if it's not screened and selectively bred against with health testing. Your average "shepherd mix" at the shelter is probably lab/shepherd/pit and will be relatively healthy if kept at an idea weight. Goldens nearly all get cancer. A fluffy yellow mixy mutt at least stands a chance of not getting it.

I breed sport dogs. It takes SO MUCH time and money to breed correctly. I imported semen from abroad to try to increase the genetic diversity in my breed, because my local options all had the same issue I was trying to correct in my female. I have generations of health tests done, I can tell you what my lines carry and don't carry for. Purebred dogs are a health disaster in many many breeds, because studbooks are closed. The only way to fix these issues is outcrossing, but AKC won't allow it because purebred.

That's in addition to the ridiculous extremes that are winning in the show ring and creating frenchies that can't breathe and shepherds with extremely sloped backs and border collies that would die if they had to actually go out in a field because their coat is so fluffy.

[Anonymous]

A family member living below the poverty line paid 5k through credit cards (low income but otherwise no debts) to pay for their 1 year old puppy. The surgery was partially botched and they ended up paying another 2k. They were in debt for years after and now have pet insurance but they couldn’t put the dog down - very softhearted person. Some people start GoFund me campaigns to pay (this person did not but I wish they had).

[Anonymous]

Most people do not have pet insurance, which 99% of the time, enriches the insurance company, because you end up paying more than you save in vet expenses.

When your pet is young, just make sure their environment is safe and they don't accidentally ingest a toxin or a foreign object that will cause obstruction. That is the main cause of expenses when pets are young. This vigilance is a 100% on you, the owner.

When your pet is old, they can have cancer and all sorts of ailments. Most people put their pets down after a certain threshold of expense, or when quality of life is just not there.

[Anonymous]

There's two issues, really. One is the REALLY big ticket items (cancer) -- sometimes there is a way to provide some level of care more cheaply (we did this -- removed the tumor but no follow up radiation, and the dog lived another 5 years). It's also okay to say "no, we aren't going to pay $10K for this" and let the dog go in a peaceful way.

The second is the dumb stuff that can be surprisingly expensive. Our dog got a cut that got infected with scratching and by the time I saw it under his fur, it was a massive bump. So it had to be surgically removed, biopsied, and cultured. Turned out to be staph and he's totally fine, but it was super expensive for all that (I think about $1K, all in) -- and that's the sort of thing that oculd recur multiple times in a dog's life (infections, pulled muscles, teeth issues, etc.).

I've often seen dogs given up to rescue because the families couldn't afford the medical care -- that seems to me so dumb -- I'd rather the rescue groups just give the families the $$ to pay for the medical treatment, rather than let them give up the dog and the rescue group then fosters and pays for the medical treatment and the poor dog has to be bounced around when it's already sick.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most dogs don't require insanely expensive surgeries until they are elderly, and at that point most people opt to put them down, understanding that they've lived a good life.

Unless your dog is a purebred from a sketchy breeder who doesn't health test (or a purebred from a rescue, which assumes sketchy breeder), the odds of something like hip dysplasia or an ACL tear in a pet dog is minimal. (This is assuming you are keeping them at a healthy weight and doing a reasonable amount of fitness with them). Most mutts are relatively healthy.

Totally disagree with all of that. I think the pound dogs are the least healthy. Usually they're from puppy mills

No puppy mill is breading the mutt that I have.

[Anonymous]

Having to put down healthy family pets because families can't afford surgeries is one of the reason that being a vet is such a miserable job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Having to put down healthy family pets because families can't afford surgeries is one of the reason that being a vet is such a miserable job.

Don't most vets understand that the majority of people can't spend that sort of money? Or were they all born UMC?

A local vet talked my poor aunt into spending thousands on her beloved dog who was 10+ years old and needed surgery. Dog died later that year anyhow, but my aunt is still in debt and can only pay a meagre amount every month. She learned and had her other dog put down when he was in pain and on the way out. Does she have enough money to own pets? No, but she loves them and people give her dogs they don't want. I'm just glad there are some vets out there who understand this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Having to put down healthy family pets because families can't afford surgeries is one of the reason that being a vet is such a miserable job.

Don't most vets understand that the majority of people can't spend that sort of money? Or were they all born UMC?

A local vet talked my poor aunt into spending thousands on her beloved dog who was 10+ years old and needed surgery. Dog died later that year anyhow, but my aunt is still in debt and can only pay a meagre amount every month. She learned and had her other dog put down when he was in pain and on the way out. Does she have enough money to own pets? No, but she loves them and people give her dogs they don't want. I'm just glad there are some vets out there who understand this.

When we were first starting out, we had a stray that we fed. We were living off of student loans and part time temp work, so we had no money. When we found the cat listing, we got worried and took it to a vet who suggested financing options and seemed perplexed when we declined

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Having to put down healthy family pets because families can't afford surgeries is one of the reason that being a vet is such a miserable job.

Don't most vets understand that the majority of people can't spend that sort of money? Or were they all born UMC?

A local vet talked my poor aunt into spending thousands on her beloved dog who was 10+ years old and needed surgery. Dog died later that year anyhow, but my aunt is still in debt and can only pay a meagre amount every month. She learned and had her other dog put down when he was in pain and on the way out. Does she have enough money to own pets? No, but she loves them and people give her dogs they don't want. I'm just glad there are some vets out there who understand this.

Yes, in life people take advantage of you and your feelings, even vets and doctors. Vulnerable people are always taken advantage of, and we are all vulnerable at some point in our lives, unless we're heartless robots.