Vets who value their collected money for treatment MORE than saving the Cat's life

by Mary
(Virginia, USA)

I have worked with Cat rescue many years and had many cats in my life and have been blessed to have several EXCELLENT VETS who put the wellness of their animal patients BEFORE the collection of funds to treat them in emergencies.
Dont get me wrong, I know Vets NEED to collect their fees to operate their hospitals, and I know some people take advantage of this and sometimes do not pay, which has caused many Vets to NOT take in a patient without their fees up front.
But my question is this:
What about the occasional EMERCENCY that comes on without warning and your payday is a few days away?
Is our pets expected to HANG ONTO LIFE and NOT DIE while waiting for our paycheck to arrive?
Sometimes the emergency is of a timely nature and you cannot wait or the animal will surely die.
Shouldn’t VETS look at the fact that saving the life of the animal comes FIRST in this situation?
Should they be considered passionate if they turn away a pet who will die within hours without immediate treatment if the owner cannot pay for two days or maybe one week?
I had such an experience this past week that I'd like to share.

I recently moved to Virginia from North Carolina which hit me for ALL my savings. I was awaiting my paycheck which was coming this past Friday (yesterday). All of a sudden Wednesday night (two days prior to getting paid) our cat Timmy Toes fell VERY ILL.
Here is the story:

Just last week, all was well here at our home with all the kittys. Wednesday night, my daughter was filling water bowls and said that our POLYDACTAL (extra toes cat) was not himself. True enough, he wasn’t perky and playful as usual. He was laying around and when you call to him he would not even look at you. We tried coaxing him with yummy can food and tuna water but nothing drew his attention. When we picked him up and urged him to walk he would just lay down.
We called every LOCAL vet around (we just moved to Virginia and had not located a regular vet here locally) but NO ONE would take him without ALL the money up front!!! (Our move cost us over 2000.00 USA funds so we was pretty tapped out.

We became very stressed feeling we was going to lose our Timmy Toes because all the local vets was only interested in getting their money up front NOT IN SAVING THE CATS LIFE!

Finally it became obvious Timmy Toes was BLOCKED (urinary crystals). He could not urinate although he tried without success. I KNEW this was a fatal thing if not attended to ASAP but no Vet would assist us. I threatened to call newspapers and report them and had my choice words with them all but most just hung up on me.

We finally decided instead of letting Timmy die a horrible , painful death, we would have to have him put down (even though he is only 3 years old). We were devastated and heartbroken to feel this was our only option to get him out of pain.
Bad thing was most of these Vets and even the Humane Society wanted over 150.00 to JUST EUTHANIZE HIM! UN-HEARD OF!!
Most of them quoted me a sum of 3,000 USA dollars to treat him.

Finally I called a Vet who is 40 miles away and expressed my dilemma and by this time I was crying non stop. This Vet was SO COMPASSIONATE! She wasnt even concerned with the money, ONLY that she be allowed to save the cat and we would work out the payment later. WHAT A BLESSING SHE WAS.

We rushed our Timmy Toes to her (40 miles away) and she took him right away and began prompt treatment on him and we was of course right, he was hopelessly blocked which can result in death quickly.
This was Wednesday night.
On Thursday morning, she called very early to tell us she had inserted a catheter and found he had a lot of crystals and grit in his urine and was in very bad shape when he was admitted the night before, but was doing better Thursday morning.
She left the catheter in and hooked him to IV fluids to flush his system and put an E collar on him to keep him from pulling out his catheter.
He was given time released antibiotic injection and keep medicated to keep him from over exerting himself while the medication was working.

On Friday morning we got a call and he was doing GREAT. His urine had flushed out all signs of crystals and the urine was no longer flowing red but clearing up rapidly. He was eating and drinking and walking about.

By Friday afternoon, the vet called and said he could come home and complete his recovery and that he was doing remarkable.

With ALL his emergency care and boarding and medications as well as treatment, we was only charged an un-heard of fee of $235.00 USA dollars! When we picked him up she even offered us a option of paying payments or just a partial payment. Fortunately, we had got paid by this time and was able to pay his bill.
The bottom line was that this WONDERFUL VET put the life of this cat before her own payment policy and saved his life (at an un-heard of low amount) and did a GREAT job of saving him.

All other vets quoted me sums of 1000.00 to 3,000 dollars. And NO ONE would take him and save his life and let us pay on Friday (two days after being admitted) like this wonderful Vet did.

Timmy Toes is now home with us again and doing very well and we have found a Vet who puts her patients FIRST when the need is GREAT. I am so thankful for VETS like her. Although the drive there is almost an hour away, She is WELL WORTH the drive because she has proven that her patients COME FIRST.

What is wrong with these Vets out there who seem to not even care that an animal is suffering or dying? It just seems like this is a poor way to maintain a good relationship with their clients and their patients.

Money is truly the ROOT OF ALL EVIL and sadly, many animals die in the USA because some VETS MUST collect un-heard of amounts up front to save them. This to me is TERRIBLE.
What happens next when our human Doctors do this same thing?
VERY FRIGHTENING to think of.

A GOOD, CARING VET is worth their weight in gold.
When seeking a good Vet , CALL CALL AND CALL some more until you find one who values the life of your pet BEFORE the ALMIGHTY DOLLAR. There are some CARING ones left out there. You have to seek them out.
One word of advice. PET INSURANCE is WELL WORTH the cost.
Look into it and protect your pet because emergencies do not PRE-ANNOUNCE its self usually.

Best wishes to all and their Cats
Mary in VA, USA