I have a question that will sound dumb. Our dog has a damaged knee. He was at the vets today and the vet said he needs this operation to correct the problem and the operation will be at least 500.00. He tore something in his knee somehow. The vet said many athletes get this type of injury, like football players when they get tackled and knocked down from the side, or baseball players when they slide into a base. Sparky doesn't get into athletics. However, he has tripped on our stairs and that''s probably where this came from. It doesn't help that he will be 9 this year. Does anyone know if there is such a place that will help with high vet bills? ( Quit laughing) He needs this operation, but we don't have 500.00 to spare. We're paying off a 400.00 bill from Kevin's surgery, we're getting a 600.00 bill for his orthotics, and we will probably get a 400.00 bill for my orthotics. If these places won't arrange a payment schedule for us it will all go on a credit card. That' what's been used to fix the cars recently. Not a comfortable time financially right now. I plan to look up some dog or pet forums for advice, too.
Becky, There used to be (and probably still is) a health insurance you can purchase for your cats and dogs (and probably other animals as well). I don't know if the dog would be covered for everything because of his age or what he is covered for might be limited for a time. It might be worth looking into - the application for health insurance should be right at the Vets office. Brenda (PS - The only dumb question is the question you don't ask - or one that I might ask... :wink: )
I've seen that and wondered how real it was. I'm betting if he was purebred it would be easier to find help somewhere. Sparky is a little bit of everything, though.
I would speak with your vet and explain your financial delema. My son's ol' dog had a big tumor growing out of his paw making him uncomfortable. So we took him to the vet and they wanted $450.00 for the operation. I spoke to the vet and explained that we didnt have $450.00 so they lowered it to $200.00. They took off the chest x-ray and some labs and things that in my opinion were just pork for the bill. So talk to your vet and see how they can trim some non-essentials down on the bill. Good luck!
Hi, Becky. I was a vet tech for several years (and breeder, trainer, etc.). He sounds like he probably tore his ACL (anterior cruciate ligament...sorry, I'm no speller). That price is actually very, very good for any surgical procedure of that sort. If it is an ACL tear, you have a couple of choices. One option is to go in with "fishing line" and they create a new ligament of sorts. Be warned that it is no gaurantee that the dog will be pain free or that the line will hold up. If the dog is large it sometimes takes a very thick line that may not heal well. Another surgical option is called a tibial plateau leveling osteotomy. That surgery is newer and probably alot more expensive. I've never seen it performed, but it seems as though it would elimate some of the complications associated with the former method. There are certainly health insurance plans for animals, but with his age and the condition already existing, I'm not sure they would take him as a client. With his age, I'd be more apt to give him asprin for the pain (2-3 day depending on his weight). You can also give him glucosamine condroitin suppliments, which are often found in premium commercial dog foods, but it might not help much at this stage in the game. HTH
HI Becky I don't know where you live or if you live close to a big city or not. But, I know if you live by a college that has a vet school they will do it alot cheaper for the students to learn. We have use them before and they do a wonderful job on the animal. You might want to look into that. The school is like a beauty school where you go get your cut and fix cheaper by people that are learning. But, they have people looking over them that know what they are doing. Just a thought. Something to look into :lol:
Brooke, that's exactly what the vet says he has. The first word in what you said he has didn't sound quite right, though, and if I can find the paper the vet gave us I'll double check. He's already on those medications you mentioned. Would it help to wrap the knee? I tried that yesterday, wrapping upward from his ankle to the top of his leg, but it kept sliding off. I even cut the toe out of one of Jeannie's socks to slide over the bandage so it would stay up, but it didn't help. It seemed to me like he walked just a little better with the bandage, but like I said it kept falling off. It seems to me I need something to go up over his back somehow?
Well....the way you would go about the wrapping should actually resemble a sling of sorts, and I'm not so sure that you could do it long term. You would start by wrapping the area just below the knee, toward the hock...it is kinda complicated to talk you through it. But if you know the area I am talking about, between the knee and hock, then you would wrap it there and then form a sling with the wrap up over the top of the knee. Depending on the dog, it might involve wrapping up over the back and around the abdomin...there are also carts that help with mobility in severe cases. And I'm wondering if wrapping is really something you should do for it to heal at all....they need to be able to adapt to walking on it. I had a dog with an ACL tear once. He was a 120 pound German Shepherd, which accounts for the injury (doesn't take much when you are lugging around that much weight). I couldn't afford the surgery, and the vets I spoke with thought that with the heavy line it wouldn't heal well either. We used 3 asprin a day for the worst times. It will develop its own scar tissue, which can be good or bad I suppose. But my dog ended up having good days where he could run and hardly limp at all. We did more pain management than anything else. The idea about the vet school is a good one, although many schools charge the same or more...but if you could find an orthopedic surgery department doing some test runs of that second surgery I mentioned (tibial plateau leveling osteotomy) you might be able to be a test subject...but I think that surgery has been around a for a few years now and might be difficult to find someone doing anything "new" for an ACL. If the injury is fresh and you don't think you can have surgery done, talk to your vet about pain management. After a while it will begin to heal to some degree on its own and he should be able to have use of that leg. At 9 years old he might have started having pain anyway to deal with, so this injury might not be as "urgent" as what it feels like right now.
The vet said he needs the surgery or it will go into a degenerative state. He said it won't heal it will get worse without treatment. Yeah, he's been having other problems. He's got lyme disease and he's beginning to have arthritis. He lets me rub his hips to get relief for that. I think with a longer bandage I could wrap him nicely, and I think he got relief from that. Thanks for all the advice Brooke. It's hard to watch him suffer and not know how to help him.
