The other day Cassie flew into the air, chasing Ball up the driveway, and came down wrong on a hind leg. She yelped once, licked her foot, and then went on about her frenetic business.
She seemed OK. Maybe a little sore but not enough to slow her down. She’s still racing around like a rocket, lobbying for doggy walks, and throwing stuffed teddy bears, stuffed vultures, stuffed Angry Birds, and tennis balls at the human in an unceasing campaign to get all of the above airborne.
And yet…and yet, she’s been off her game a bit. Instead of harrying the human every waking moment, she’s taken to moping in the back room or the office. Her enthusiasm for trotting outdoors at the drop of every hat is limited.
A close inspection of the offended foot reveals a worrisomely lopping toe.
Notice how that toe on the inner side of the foot on the left looks deformed? The corresponding toe on the other foot looks straight and smooth, and it lies tight against the foot. The bent toe is loose and stands away from the other toes.
Looked this up on the Internet and came away abhorred: vet bills running into the thousands of dollars; dogs wrapped up in casts under which any number of infections and mildew grew; dogs who ended up having to have infected legs amputated; dogs developing gangrene under too-tight wrappings; dogs ripping their own foot off trying to remove the damn cast; dog owners reporting that casting the leg in such injuries appears to be a scam whose main purpose is to milk the owner’s bank accounts; dog owners reporting that some vets say to just leave the dog alone and let nature take its course; dog owners hacking off casts themselves, to find the dog was just fine without it and healed up with no problem when left alone…. Oh, shit.
Well, by this morning she didn’t seem great. So I took her to a vet M’hijito found by way of his father’s current wife. This lady practices in a part of town called “Little Mexico,” where most of the shopping consists of Dollar Stores and Goodwill outlets. Which is to say, she doesn’t cater to a clientele with deep pockets. The vet I’ve been using, referred to me by La Maya (who has an actual income and a partner with an actual income), is what we might call a thousand-dollar-a-day vet. She’s close, and that’s nice. But she knows how much dog lovers living in the $400,000 to $1.5 million houses that populate North Central can be persuaded to pay.
Vet looked at the dog’s foot and opined that it was either broken or dislocated. In either event, the best course of action was to leave it alone. She said she would try to pull it back into place if she were sure it was dislocated, but without an X-ray, she didn’t want to do that — because it could, after all, be broken. She thinks the best thing to do is let nature take its course. Gave me an anti-inflammatory, handed me a $58 bill, and said good-bye.
In six days, I can afford to have the dog X-rayed (can’t just now, unfortunately: am at the end of the budget cycle and all is pretty much spent). I may call again then and ask if they’ll X-ray her, just to see what the story is.
Maybe not, too. The vet said the dog will recover. Maybe less really is more.
You know, consumers have to be careful with veterinarians. It’s no less true that you should get a second opinion when a vet recommends some pricey procedure than that you should when a dentist does the same. Yesterday I talked to a young fellow who came by to provide an estimate for pruning a hugely overgrown carob tree in M’hijito’s front yard. By way of chatting, we found we each had wounded small dogs. His family’s lab had landed on their chihuahua during a frolic. Whacked the little dog’s leg.
Wife took the lap-dog to the vet, where several hundred dollars’ worth of X-rays ensued. She was informed that the dog needed $1700 worth of surgery “to round off” a hip bone, and that was just for starters. When he recited this story, I said, “Look. Really: get a second opinion. I had a German shepherd that a vet said needed dual hip replacements, to the tune of thousands of dollars. I took her to another vet for a second opinion, and he said the X-rays the first outfit had done were not good enough to diagnose anything about the dog’s hips, and that the dog most certainly did not need surgery.”
This tale got his attention. He said he would do that before giving the go-ahead for this elaborate procedure.
Most vets are good people who do not want to cheat you or inflict unnecessary treatments and pain on animals by way of fleecing their owners. However, there’s no question that some of them are in it for the money. In general, U.S. and British pets are over-vaccinated, over-examined, and over-treated.
Caveat dog owner…
I guess I’m a sucker and take the dog to the vet most of the time when I see something not quite right. I’ve never felt ripped off, though, or been sold expensive surgeries.
Obviously one needs to take the dog to a vet when it appears to be sick or injured. The issues are a) whether the vet’s diagnosis is accurate; b) whether the treatment is appropriate or whether it’s overkill; c) whether the price for the treatment is fair; d) whether treatment is even necessary at all.
If you’ve ever sat in a vet’s waiting room for ten minutes being bombarded with yak from a video going on about how you need to schlep your dog in once a year for a “well dog check” and about how your six- or seven-year-old dog needs a special “senior” check-up once a year, willy-nilly, you’ll know what I mean.
The word is finally beginning to reach the public that most people do not need annual physicals — this has been known for many years but only recently has started to penetrate our collective consciousness.
What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander: it makes sense to go to a doctor if you’re symptomatic and it makes sense to have screening tests that have been proven to save lives. But it does not makes sense to run to the doctor for nothing, and a wise consumer gets a second opinion when surgery or expensive treatment is advised. Same principle applies to veterinary.
Vets’ thinking is not the same, nor are their prices uniform…even if your pet does need a procedure or long-term medicating, it’s a smart idea to ask around.
Poor Cassie!
Interesting link from the Chicago trib about over vaccination. I think Kitty PoP just gets rabies vaccine at his yearly check-up. I can’t recall a shot other than that since his kitten appointments with all of his initial vaccines.
I tend to look at vets like car mechanics. Sometimes you really need the closest possible, but more often you want to go to one that you know, trust, and respect and is looking out for the best interests of your pocketbook and your possession (be it pet or car).
The truth is, there’s strong evidence that pets don’t need constant revaccination for rabies, any more than they need annual shots for the other dread diseases. But because rabies is virtually 100% fatal, as a matter of public policy we have laws that require people to shoot up their dogs with rabies vaccine annually or triannually, whether they need it or not. Check out, for example, http://bit.ly/maWbwq .
Because of the rabies vaccination laws, dogs are no longer major carriers of rabies in the U.S. and human cases have dropped dramatically over the past decades — this, however, is partially attributable to the availability of prophylactic treatment post-exposure. In the U.S., prevalence varies by region. A few countries have even managed to eradicate the disease within their borders. Here’s a very interesting article on the subject: http://bit.ly/KdqlQ9 . And at Wikipedia, scroll down for a startling map on the prevalence of rabies in regions of the U.S.: http://bit.ly/113fIHm .
The main carriers are bats, followed by raccoons and skunks. Since cats are likely to tangle with raccoons, which like coyotes have become widely urbanized, if you let your kitty out of the house it should have a rabies shot. It’s worth noting, too, that bats commonly live in attics and have been known to fly into homes through chimneys and open doors or windows.
Cats are prone to life-threatening reactions from the rabies vaccine. To avoid the worst of the rabies vaccine’s side effects, be sure the vet does not also administer an adjuvant to your cat. See this article on the subject of feline vaccines in general and on the correct rabies vaccine for cats: http://www.catinfo.org/?link=vaccines .
Mr FS and I often say we can’t afford a dog!
Item 1: My sister-in-law brought her dog in because she thought it was stung by a bee. Vet said: let’s do some tests: many hundreds of dollars and an overnight stay for observation (more$$) yielded nothing in particular. Dog got some bee sting antidote.
Item 2: Friends decided to take their beloved dog to Houston for open-heart surgery. $6000. The dog died a year later.
I guess pets are priceless, but I am truly afraid to get one!
Where is it written that you have to get open-heart surgery for a dog?
Yes. You love your pet and you treat it like it’s a member of your family. But for cryin’ out loud…IT’S A DOG!!!!!!!!! It is not your child. And no matter what you try to do to make it immortal, with any luck at all it is not going to outlive you.
Charlie was stung by a bee when he tried to bite it. As you can imagine, he evinced considerable discomfort. I dropped my dinner fork and raced to the vet with him. They also proposed hundreds of dollars of tests and medication. Fortunately, M’hijito walked in to the office just as I was about to hand the dog over.
He took one long, quiet look at the dog.
“There’s nothing wrong with this dog,” said he.
Amazingly, the vet, faced with a firm “THERE’S NOTHING WRONG WITH THIS DOG,” concurred. At that point she admitted that the expensive tests were unnecessary and that the dog would probably be just fine.
We left, having paid a modest fee for the office visit.
Charlie no longer snaps at flying insects.
Oh yeah, another one. Recently-graduated niece adopted a rescue dog. Dog required $1500 of medical care. Niece didn’t have enough to pay her own health insurance premiums. (This was before the Affordable Care Act, btw)
We need an Affordable Veterinary Care Act, next.
My cats are 17 and 13 and they both have treatments for some ailments. I have to put my foot down and take a firm stand on some of the other recommendations that the vet makes every time I go in there. I’m not trying to deny my cats good health, but at the same time a lot of the things are ‘nice to have’ or ‘it might help with this’. Being able to make the distinction on the behalf of your pet is a big responsibility, and while I don’t blame the vets for trying to increase their bottom line, your ultimate responsibilities lie with yourself and with your pets, and while the vet might try to make you believe otherwise, I doubt many pets would want to be poked, prodded, cut open, medicated and all the like that the vet seems to think is within reason.
What a good piece….I have suspected this for some time about our vet. Some time ago I took our 13 year old cat to the vet because she seemed lethargic and was urinating any and every where except the kitty litter. Of course the Doc had to take a urine sample which revealed reason for some concern…perhaps a UTI and he wrote a prescription for an antibiotic. Although this cleared up the UTI…she continued to urinate any where accept the kitty litter. The Doc decided…”she has anger issues”. I guess we were supposed to take her to a “shrink”… Final tab….$350….with no resolution. But our cat does spend a lot more time outside….
OMG, that is amazing.
In my experience with cats, which is extensive (my mother loved them, and we always had them in Arabia because dogs were verboten), once a cat starts to go outside its catbox, it cannot be persuaded to go back to using the catbox exclusively. They may refuse to use it at all, or they may use the catbox and the floor, at will. And no, changing the litter every day and picking up every bit of poop the minute it’s deposited does not help.
My ex- and I had cats that destroyed expensive wall-to-wall carpeting. Later, in another house, we had a cat that decided the litterbox would never do. She would pee and poop around the litterbox, so the floor always stank. I believe they’re drawn back to places where urine is deposited. No amount of scrubbing, even with ammonia or Clorox, removes the odor to the point where a cat can’t detect it.
{heeee!} This reminds me of what happened to some friends of ours. They got this cat, which they doted on. They’d moved into a house that had a fireplace, and during the summer they noticed the cat had developed a liking for the fireplace. It would go in past the fire screen and play around in there and then come out. They thought this was SOOO cute.
Come winter, they fired up a log in the fireplace and…well! It quickly became apparent why the cat was attracted to the fireplace: it had been peeing in there all summer long! Lighting a fire permeated the entire house with parfum de chat. They tried everything they and every clean-up expert could think of, and NOTHING would get rid of the stink, which had soaked into the brickwork. The fireplace was rendered useless. Permanently.
This characteristic is the specific reason I’ll never have a cat again. To my mind, they’re much dirtier than dogs.
The cat has “anger issues”…snark!!!! I LOVE IT!!!!
Geez, I had no idea that so many people have vets suggesting expensive treatments! The most I’ve paid in the past four years for any veterinary care was a total of $1,500 for emergency services when I found my dog, Sadie, an hour after breakfast in a sad state. She wasn’t able to stand and her mucous membranes were turning blue. It was a Sunday so I had to take her to the more expensive emergency vet. Unfortunately, despite their treatment she died of heart failure. It was very sudden and unexpected since she had no prior symptoms of heart problems. The $1,500 charges covered the office visit, diagnostics, fluids, treatment (they had to drain fluid from the pericardium), repeated resuscitation, and cremation. I didn’t care about the charges; I just really miss my dog.
Thank goodness my remaining dog, Hannah, is still very healthy, even though she is now 10 (which is getting into senior years for a 50-lb dog). Here in Chicago we are required by the county to vaccinate for rabies and to register our dogs. If one wants to get a dog park license, then other vaccinations are required, as well as a clean fecal test. And if you ever want to kennel your dog while out of town on vacation, you will be have to those vaccinations, too. Other annual costs include a heartworm test and heartworm preventative medication.
I worked at a veterinarian’s office throughout high school. I saw puppies with distemper and parvovirus, as well as dogs with high loads of intestinal parasites, heartworm infection, and a dog with such a severe flea infestation it literally was bled to death. This vet clinic was in an area with a mix of middle to lower income people, so there was a wide range of clientele. I think it’s an exception for people to spend massive amounts of money on their pets, but I guess we all define that amount differently.
That’s a shame. I’m sorry you lost your pal unexpectedly.
Emergency vets are hideously expensive…and it seems as though these dire situations never fail to occur on a weekend or at night. There’s a veterinary practice here that does stay open into the evening and on Saturday, charging normal office rates during those periods. But you’re out of luck at midnight or on Sunday.
For me, $1500 would be a major hit. In a good month, that would clean out my discretionary savings — but most of the time these days discretionary savings is at or below $1,000. I would have to raid retirement or survival savings to come up with a grand and a half.
In the incident I described in the post, where a veterinarian tried to convince me that my year-old German shepherd needed replacements of both hips, they proposed to charge me $10,000 for the privilege. Apparently they thought I was dumb enough to fall for this, since they said it with a straight face.
I believe that practices like that depend on people’s sentimentality about their pets. The breeder had guaranteed the dog and actually offered to take her back and replace her with another pup, and some years earlier one of the top Ger-shep trainers in the state had remarked to me that it was better and kinder to put a dysplastic dog down than to make it suffer through a lot of surgery. Fortunately, she was rescued from the needle when I took her to another vet for a second opinion.