A few days later, when a veterinarian oncologist said there was certainly something I could do, I uplifted my mind. But then she started talking about money: it would cost thousands of dollars.
I had already spent about $ 2,000 in three days at two veterinary clinics. Blue’s next CT scan will cost an additional $ 2,500, and subsequent radiation therapy can cost at least $ 9,500 more.
This is a problem faced by many pet owners. Medical costs for dogs and cats can easily reach thousands of dollars. But for many of us, these are beloved families. Also, about 86% say that if a pet requires extensive veterinary care, they will pay whatever they need.
That feeling is more about love than real math. It was a real cold shock when Blue’s expected total expenses were summed up on paper. Getting the best treatment available for his tumor can cost more than $ 15,000. That was when everything went well. I have already spent a lot. And it was unclear how long it would buy him.
Oncologists at North Star VETS in New Jersey confirm that pet owners know in advance what they are doing financially because many cannot afford that kind of expense. Said. , Or their children, medical care. Calls like I’ve received are usually a painful beginning to the end of their pet’s story.
Like human health care, veterinary care is a rapidly growing market of costs. According to the American Pet Products Association, pet owners in 2021 have spent $ 34.3 billion on veterinary care and products, starting at $ 24 billion in 2010.
And, like human health care, there are advanced treatments for pets in a variety of veterinary disciplines, including dermatology, ophthalmology, orthopedics, and, in the case of my dog, oncology.
The founders of NorthStar VETS added radiation oncology to the clinic’s services after their dog developed a brain tumor in 2014. He partnered with a company called Pet Cure Oncology because he had to drive from New Jersey to Pennsylvania to find radiation therapy that would cure the cancer. A radiation center will be opened on the North Star campus in May 2021.
And that’s where my adoption shelter mutt ended for treatment a year later.
PetCure provides what is called stereotactic radiation. This is a gold standard radiation therapy for humans. In 2015, former President Jimmy Carter received stereotactic radiotherapy for melanoma of the brain. In 2019, Supreme Court Judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg had it for a pancreatic tumor.
For dogs, stereotactic radiotherapy is available primarily at university-affiliated veterinary teaching hospitals and a small number of private clinics nationwide. If pet owners live near these places and can afford them, their beloved animals can receive the same cancer treatments as the former president and justice.
Ben Chiswick, Vice President of Operations and Growth at PetCure, said: “Much more accurate and influential than other forms of radiation therapy. The more likely a beam of radiation reaches a tumor, the less likely it will come into contact with the surrounding healthy tissue. This is the cause of side effects. “
Stereotactic radiotherapy is given over 1 to 3 days while anesthetizing the dog. In the case of Blue, the recommendation was a three-day regimen with cumulative anesthesia and radiation effects, which he was temporarily confused and almost exhausted, but traditional radiation given daily for several weeks. Much better than the course.
I was lucky to live near the clinic. After spending $ 5,000 on a veterinary invoice for a previous dog leg injury, I also bought pet insurance when I adopted Blue II. Throughout his life, insurance premiums averaged about $ 700 a year. This is less than the cost of many human health insurances a month. Maybe I never used it, but if Blue needed it, it was there.
Now he needed it. When I asked an expert over the phone if Blue Pet Insurance would offer a refund for this type of radiation therapy, the answer was yes. So I illuminate the CT scan with green light, check the credits available on Mastercard, cover the cost of the insurance refund arriving, and take him to the radiation device faster than the tumor grows. I did.
With more than 100,000 veterinarians working in the United States, the proliferation of pandemic pets and the tremendous demand for care have created long wait times for many pet owners. Veterinary oncology is even more inaccessible. Only about 1,000 veterinarians have a degree in medicine or radiation oncology or surgery. According to Chiswick, it can take four to six weeks nationwide to be accessible. Everywhere I called near my house in New Jersey, I was told to wait 2-6 weeks just for the first consultation.
My usual vet said it wasn’t fast enough. Blue needed us to find a better way.
So I got up at 3am, went to the North Star emergency department at the time most likely to be empty, and waited for a few hours, persuading him to talk to Blue. My regular veterinarian sent his documents and x-rays digitally.
The North Star emergency vet told me not to wait. Oncologists may arrive in Blue that day or the next day. Fortunately, medical oncologists were able to assess Blue that same day.
Within a week, a CT scan and consultation with a radiation oncologist were done, and within two weeks of my first trip to a regular veterinarian, he started his first treatment. Approximately 48 hours after the treatment was completed, he bounced around the park and chased the squirrel in the backyard. He had no side effects other than the need for a temporary drop in his dry eyes. There was a lump on his face where the cancer broke his bone, but he was in the dog version of ibuprofen and showed no signs of discomfort.
Those who stink a little have even realized that begging for a treat now works every time.
How much was the cost at that time?
Blue’s health insurance was purchased individually when he was one year old. (According to PetCure, more and more clients are taking out pet insurance through work, just like human health insurance.) In his 12-year life, I paid about $ 9,000. .. The policy paid more than $ 10,000 for his first cancer treatment, plus other refunds for smaller veterinary invoices over the years. We set up insurance with a 70% repayment rate to keep our annual premiums down, so we covered over $ 4,500 in deductions from personal savings and out-of-pocket payments.
Of course, if the dog has never had an expensive diagnosis, the math is the other way around. My other dogs have the same policy. So far with her, I’m paying more premiums than before. And that’s typical insurance — I had to fight for days to pay one of Blue’s claims in full. Still, I’m glad I had it. I will never have another dog without it.
“Literally, every client we see will benefit from it,” says Chiswick. “This is the same cost-benefit analysis as human medicine. You may be throwing money away, or it may save you thousands of dollars.”
As of May 2022, Blue was one of only 4.41 million insured pets across North America, according to the North American Pet Health Insurance Association. In the United States, these policies are primarily adopted by dog owners, but only a few of the 69 million households in the United States have dogs.
Still, according to the association, the pet insurance market has grown by 27.7% over the past year. Based on conversations with experts and Blue’s veterinary team, many people who buy these policies are like me. I have been hit by a big veterinary invoice in the past.
More important to me was that if Blue survived long enough to qualify for the next round of stereotactic radiation, Blue would still be covered. Yes, it was an “if”.
Even if he spends $ 15,000 on treatment, the expected survival time is only 6-18 months. Doctors warned me that blue would probably be the lower limit of that range because his type of cancer is squamous epithelial cells. It is an aggressive type that fights back. The second round of stereotactic radiation is recommended only after 6 months and probably only buys about half the time of the first round.
In other words, if Blue reaches mid-October, I have the option to redo all of this to help him survive Christmas.
When Blue was first diagnosed, all my friends with pets I asked for advice said they would do whatever it took to save their pets.
One teenager fighting cancer and spending almost all his time at home in isolation from his dog said he would now be in debt to save his dog’s life.
Another person whose father recently completed radiation therapy for eye cancer said he wouldn’t even hesitate to try to save the two hybrids.
A friend of mine who has a cat that survived stage 3 B-cell non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma said she would also go to the case of Blue.
A woman working in a salon where I do haircuts told me that she had spent $ 15,000 on dog surgery without pet insurance and would definitely do it again.
As pet parents go, I’m very common, some smart, some lucky, and I’m in a position to actually do whatever a dog needs to get the best treatment.
Larisa Love, director of clinical communications at PetCure, says her team hears the same every day from callers to the helplines they run.
“They say it constantly,” Ai told me. “I heard about my wife’s husband who had just died of cancer. This was her dog. He will do everything he can to save this dog. It’s part of a complete family. Cancer. Clients who have experienced cancer say dogs and cats have survived cancer, and now they say they are trying to get their pets over cancer. “
Sadly, in the case of Blue, his tumor roared back in late June. Another $ 2,000 CT scan (covered by insurance) showed that the cancer would overtake him even with a “radiation boost” and additional chemotherapy.
And when I’m writing this, we don’t have much time left.
He is comfortable, taking painkillers and I am at least relieved to have done everything possible for him. We walked in the park for another couple of months, swam in the river and snuggled up in bed.
If you have to start over, do the same.
Kim Kavin wrote about Blue in his 2012 book, Little Boy Blue: Rescue of a Puppy from the Row of Death and a Journey to the Truth of His Owner.
