<p>Pet health insurance:
does not cover a lot of things you may need for your pet!
impossible to get on pets/breeds with health issues</p>
<p>If small animal insurance is like equine insurance, it only covers a malady once. If your pet has a recurring problem, no coverage. Pre-existing conditions are excluded too.</p>
<p>Hops- the chin healed very well, we would not have done that if we were not confident, but yeah, I can see how cold it looks! Hey, when you have a huge deductible/OOP for your entire life, you learn to do more for yourself!</p>
<p>Guess I can’t complain about my dogs’ last visit. They boarded for six nights and had their annual exams while they were there for about $400.</p>
<p>ghostfire13, I willl fly to your neighborhood for vet services, because it would still be cheaper than around here (after including the airfare.) However, that said, we have used the emergency vets on two occasions. The first was about 15 years ago for our cat, who was having trouble breathing. Their bill that long ago was around 250, including x rays, but no overnight. She got a little better, but ultimately died in a couple of weeks (even though our own vet followup x rays showed her lungs to be better.)</p>
<p>When my dog ate a bottle of Advil last december, I first called our regular vet. He said to give her peroxide to induce vomiting, and I did (with DD’s help). I saw many partially dissolved pills come up. We called the dog poison control a bit later, because DH was concerned about dog (that btw costs $65). I then took dog to ER vet, but knowing how these things can run up, DH discussed each test and treatment with vet, and we eliminated a few that he felt could wait for our regular vet if needed, but DH is an MD, so not everyone would be able to comment on the tests. It still was $400 for the visit.</p>
<p>When our little dog got a bad cut a few weeks later, DH stitched her up. I could not see spending the fee for the ER.</p>
<p>The animal ERs are very expensive. That said, in southern Connecticut we have at least two choices. One is owned by a veterinary hospital chain and the other is owned by Cornell. </p>
<p>My most recent ER experience is with the Cornell facility in Stamford – and their charge for the needed procedure, for my elderly dog, was amazingly reasonable, on a Sunday night. I believe it was approximately the same as my regular vet would have charged on a Monday morning – but I had to be on a plane Monday morning and it couldn’t wait.</p>
<p>For a real ER emergency – I’m sure it’s pretty expensive. But so is the people ER.</p>
<p>Many years ago, when we were first starting out, we had a number of cats and dogs, and vet care was expensive then, too…</p>
<p>Emergency vet care is expensive and it can seem outrageous (well, okay, is outrageous if you have to pay it) but the reality is they are maintaining a facility that is open, of not 24/7, something close to it, and they have dvm’s on staff and other people to take care of the animals and so forth, which is if I can do math this morning, is going to be significantly higher then a vets office that is open 5 or maybe 6 days a week, at most 8 hours…and they probably don’t do the volume of business a regular vet does, even though there are very few pet hospitals and cover a wide area usually…</p>
<p>Plus as others point out, we don’t realize how expensive human medical emergency treatment is because most of us have insurance that even as wacked out as that is these stays, stills pays the bulk of it. My S had to go to the emergency room to get his arm checked (ended up having a major fracture not break) of the upper arm, and the full bill would have been something like 3k, and all they did was do a simple x ray and look at the film, and put him in a sling (no cast). Fall down and need stitches, it can run 1500 bucks, and so forth (it is why when I hear people tell me that the current human health system works for everyone because people can always go to the ER, I wonder if they realize how many people are forced to do that and how inefficient and expensive ER’s are because they are designed to treat emergencies, not routine stuff). Plus like hospitals, I suspect emergency vet services may end up eating bills on some people, so they do what hospitals do, cost shift to those who can pay the bills to try and make up the difference…</p>
<p>The other thing is with the cost of tests and meds, and that isn’t necessarily the vets fault. The price of those is expensive, the labs and the pet med places are expensive, it isn’t just the office. Yeah, those online pet meds places are a lot cheaper, but they buy in bulk whereas the vet’s office cannot buy on that scale, and with lab costs, I doubt they are charging that much more then it costs them. </p>
<p>And as someone who is certifiable (we once had a cat that my mother in law had taken in, a street cat, who turned out to be pregnant, ended up delivering stillborn kittens and then got massive peritonitis, rushed it to a vet on a saturday, and it ended up costing us 600 bucks…which was what we had in the bank at the time)…we did it, we couldn’t turn our back on the poor thing…and they are our family, too, and for us we have birds, and they really are like children to us.</p>
<p>I had this sent to me recently… thought it fits here:</p>
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<p>I mentioned that our lab had major surgery which resulted in a bill that was about $10,000. She required a lengthy stay as well as transfusions- etc.</p>
<p>However, after she had the surgery, the emergency clinic requested that I make an appt to have her post op care explained to me . I had already researched the procedure so I felt comfortable, but they insisted. ( this also could have been something her regular vet could handle at $40 an hour)</p>
<p>I was charged $100 for a short visit that could have consisted of a handout ( which I had to print out myself from my research).
No it wouldn’t have made that much difference to the total bill- but it galls me anyway.</p>
<p>Our two kitties always cost a whole lot more when they have their annuals compared to us because it’s full pay for them and, often times, just copay for us, so our perspective vis-a-vis “outrageous charges” is a bit imperfect.</p>
<p>
At first glance I thought you made 400 bucks.</p>
<p>Just like the dead duck should have netted $1000 to the owner LOL</p>
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ROFL 10 chars</p>
<p>We had an experience with an emergency vet earlier this year when our german shepherd/border collie rescuepuppy broke 2 bones his rear leg (tibia and fibula if I remember correctly) near the growth plate. It was late afternoon on a Saturday, so our regular (and reasonable) vet was closed. The emergency vet sedated Toby, x-rayed his break and wrapped his leg with a gigantic splint. The charge was around $600. We consulted our regular vet on Monday, and she referred us to the canine orthopedist. Toby needed surgery to insert a pin to set the bone, and another surgery to remove the pin. The entire ordeal set us back about $3,000. We nearly changed his name to Week at the Beach! I am happy to say that the leg has healed beautifully. I do remind him sometimes that he is lucky he found his way to our house.</p>
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<p>LOL. Our dog earned the nickname Aloha Dog after we plunked down a year worth of UW tuition on his emergency surgery. :eek: For a while, he was known as “the dog who ate our vacations”. He is 12.5 years old now, and knocking on wood, still thinks that he is a pup.</p>
<p>Surely enough, just right after our budget had been drained by the dog’s surgery, our little newly adopted kitten fell ill. DH took our very sick kitty to the vet. The conversation went like this.</p>
<p>“What is it, Dr. M?”
“Well, it could be viral or bacterial; we can certainly run some tests…”
“And what would the outcome be?”
“If it is viral, there are no treatments, we just have to wait and see if the cat’s immune system takes care of it”
“And with bacteria?”
“Oh, it can be treated with antibiotics!”
“How much are the tests?”
“Well, it would cost $450 for the entire panel”
“And antibiotics?”
“I believe they are around $40”
“How about this: we give the cat some antibiotics and see what happens?”</p>
<p>The cat lived. :)</p>
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<p>You guys are making false assumptions based on failure to do research or shop around. </p>
<p>I have never had to actually use the policies I have on my pets, so it is possible that they won’t pay as promised, but according to my contract there is no exclusion for genetic or inherited conditions, and it provides coverage for the life of the pet as long as the policy is renewed. There is a per-incident/illness deductible and an annual maximum pay out. (In my case I opted for the highest, $200, deductible as well as the highest, $20,000, annual payout) The plan does NOT cover routine stuff, like the annual well-dog check or vaccinations, which would be under my deductible in any case. </p>
<p>It is true that the plan would not include pre-existing conditions, but they define that to mean a condition that has been already diagnosed or shown clinical signs at the time of enrollment, not a genetic condition – and it seems to me that the people posting complaints about vet bills on this thread are upset about bills due to accidents or acute conditions in any case. </p>
<p>They do set rates in part by breed, so if you have a purebred dog that is prone to a lot of health problems, you are going to pay a higher premium. I have small, mixed-breed dogs, and I signed up when the dogs were young, so I probably qualify for better rates. But I’m not quite sure why anyone would choose to own a breed prone to health problems and then complain about vet bills.</p>
<p>In any case, it’s still a risk/benefit analysis. I pay roughly $280 per year, per dog, to protect against the risk of having to pay a lot more than that in vet bills. I wouldn’t be paying that merely to protect against the $550 bill that the OP is worried about. I’m more worried about the type of issues that run into the thousands - like the two posts immediately preceding this one. But the bottom line is, in a situation like the OP described, I would have paid $200. (I probably would have had to pay up front and wait for reimbursement, but I know that my vet takes carecredit, and I have a carecredit account from the time my daughter had her wisdom teeth removed, so that’s always available.)</p>
<p>My breed is completely disqualified from insurance.</p>
<p>what breed?</p>
<p>Our regular vet tacks on a $50 charge for taking a pet in on an emergency basis during regular office hours. She no longer charges us that, however, after I told her I wished I could get a $50 bonus every time I’m called out on an emergency (I’m a pastor, and no, I’d never charge anyone for emergency calls even though I’m part-time).</p>
<p>A couple of years ago we rushed a very sick rat to the emergency vet late at night. Dang thing died in the vet’s hand; if she had died five minutes sooner in the waiting room we’d have been $150 better off.</p>
<p>On the other hand, I’d have paid any amount to get relief for a dog with very painful blocked anal gland. There’s no way I’d have made her or me endure that all night. That was money well spent at midnight.</p>
<p>chinese sharpei
They have a genetic condition which basically makes almost all of them sick, to varying degrees. Due to a very small gene pool when breed was revitalized from very few dogs in the late 70’s and early 80’s.
Proving useful to biological science, but very hard on the pocketbook…</p>
<p>My sharpei died after about 5 minutes of emergency resuscitation at the ER vet. Cost me $1000.
Then the necropsy (had to ship body elsewhere) cost me… do not ask. It is embarassing.</p>