bloody insurance isn't going to cover it.

[steppemum]

so cross today.
steppedog has ear infection.
He has had them before, but each one a distinct infection, treated and cleared up.
He was being treated for one when we first took out the insurance 3 years ago.
Long periods with none, eg 1 year plus.

This one won't clear. He has been on meds since Nov and had a procedure under general anaesthetic to clean out ear, and it won't clear, Vet referred him to specialist, total anticipated cost £1,900.

We just don't have the money. That was why we had insurance. We can't even afford the £400+ it has cost so far.

Insurance today have refused the claim as he had an ear infection when we first took it out 3 years ago. Which stupidly, as honest people we declared.

Just don't know what to do now.

Is it not a lifetime policy you have? Did they cover you the first time?

Would you qualify for Blue Cross or similar?

the infection he had when we took it out was not covered. We didn't realise that meant they would never cover an ear infection.

Might qulify for Blue Cross, but we are not in the catchment for any of their vetinary centres

RSPCA have hospitals, worth a try? Or a payment plan?

Could you argue this? Perhaps the vet could provide evidence there is no link between the ear infection you declared and the condition now. You could ask for your claim to be reviewed by the insurers, or contact the ombudsman.

Unfortunately it then counts as an existing condition. Payment plan?

@SunInTheSkyYouKnowHowIFeel

Could you argue this? Perhaps the vet could provide evidence there is no link between the ear infection you declared and the condition now. You could ask for your claim to be reviewed by the insurers, or contact the ombudsman.

thank you, we might do this, as the vet has said to me in the past they are distinct and not connected. Although it is now obvious that he is prone to them in that ear.

Unfortunately it will count as a pre-existing condition and very few policies will cover for things like that.

Will your vet accept a payment plan? If not, do you qualify for help via the PDSA or similar?

Our own vet did say when I spoke to her last week, that if the insurance didn't come through the specialist place had made some suggestions she coudl try (when she spoke to them about the referral)

So i'm waiting for a call back from my vet.

It's just so annoying. This is literally why we pay out every month, been so careful, thought through if we could afford the dog, and with insurance yes we could.

Poor steppedog.

There are policies you can get that cover pre existing conditions but not if they have been treated for them recently

I do sympathise btw. Dcat seems to be the same. Insured, but still end up with a mahoosive bill anyway. The most annoying one was when the first 200 quid wasn't covered, and then about a quarter of the balance wasn't covered either

We had this with pre-existing dental issues.

In the end we got different- more expensive - insurance which covered it.

@steppemum - is this pseudomonas?

Got this with my pet insurance too. I'm really starting to wonder if rather than pay the (extortionate) amount that then hardly ever pays out when needed, it would be better to just pay the same amount monthly into a bank account and keep that as the vet emergency fund. At least I would be sure of being able to access it.

[quote MankyDogEar]@steppemum - is this pseudomonas?[/quote]
I don't know, what is that?
He has a bacterial ear infection. Washing the ear out every evening and treatign with the correct antibiotic isn't working. He has had the ear flushed, that didn't work, the bacteria will not go away.

Pseudomonas is a type of bacteria and it is an absolute bugger to shift. It really is worth speaking to your vet to confirm which one - they should have swabbed the infection to find out and what bacteria the infection is vulnerable to.

I am no expert but I spent more than a year and about £12,000 insurance money shifting pseudomonas out of my springer. Much of this was 'wasted' money because we/the vet just kept using only antibiotics and ear flushes. These never ever worked. There is more - much more - that you might be able to talk to your vet about doing. Thinking how maybe you could avoid the need for a specialist?

Things we learned:

1. It spreads. In the end we boil washed everything the dog came into contact with and spray disinfected the rest. A total clean down. We never handled the dog's ear without disposable gloves and took them straight off afterwards. We never used any original bottles to dose the ear: we used new 2ml syringes for each application and threw them straight afterwards. It still kept coming back and, in the end, we found it was in the house taps - having either spread from or too them - and therefore in his drinking water. We used bottled water for a few weeks and ran boiling water through the taps and bleach up into the spouts as far as possible.

1. It is opportunistic and takes hold when the dog's immune system is comrpomised. In our case, by a food intolerance. We moved him onto a true hypoallergenic diet (hydrolysed proteins only).

1. It took much more than antibiotics to kill. We had the following protocol twice a day, every day for several weeks:

• wipe all around the ear with Sterilium which is a surgical disinfectant, using a fresh peice of gauze each time
• then spray the ear with cortacare which is a steroid spray to help ease pain and reduce inflammation (important as inflammation stops the rest of the medication getting far enough in)
• 15 mins later flush the ear out with Vetruus Clorexyderm Oto Ear Solution which is a medical wash, using a syringe to apply
• 30 mins later wash with tris-nac ear solution, using a syringe to apply; I think this increases the chances of the later mediciation working
• 30 mins later inject with a dilluted form of flamazine which is a silver-based burns cream, of all things! (using a syringe to apply)

After two weeks, we swabbed and tested the ear to see if any bacteria remained. If they did, we carried on for another 2 weeks. If they didn't, we carried on anyway and then tested again 2 weeks later. We didn't stop any treatment until we had 2 x clear swab test results.

My own vet did not know about much of the above and so we wasted time and multiple different anti-biotics 'trying' things until we were referred to a specialist. However, vets on here DID know most of the above protocol and so, if I'd pushed my own vet to follow it, we may have beaten this much sooner than we did. In fact, one vet on here advised she would have followed a protocol like the one above 3-4 times a day. We 'only' did it twice a day but I also read other studies using a similar approach multiple times a day.

I am only sharing all this to give you some more to talk to your vet about - maybe to try and keep costs to a minimum?

I know if any dog of mine had a pseudomonas ear infection again, I'd be pushing for us to hit it as hard as possible, right from the off. NO messing about trying things. It was an absolute nightmare.

That sounds like it.
That is so helpful, I am going to forward it to my vet. She referred me to a specialist as she knew that they didn't knwo what to do next, so I am guessing that this is what a specialist would have done.

That is so interesting about it being in the environment, that would explain why he gets recurrances of it too.

Thank you

Can I ask, how often did you wash eg his bedding while you were treating?

Yes they have swabbed the ear since the beginning and it is a rod shaped bacteria which I can't remember the name of, but that sounds right. They have sent the swab away twice to double check which one, and also every time we go, he is swabbed and they look under the microscope to see if there are any still present.

I would willingly do all that, as it sounds as if it might work!

and how long did it take you to clear it with all that?

Pseudomonas is rod shaped.

We did one massive wash up and clean on Day 1 then used multiple lightweight throws that could be washed every 2-3 days for the rest of it. The big thing was being so, so careful not to spread it to the other ear using our hands etc. And not to pread it to ourselves (it can spread to humans and cause lung problems!). Our specialist was very particular about not reusing the bottle nozzles etc. Instead usng gloves and syringes and then throwing them away.

My understanding is that it really needs moisture too - so the chances of it being on furniture etc is low. But the specialist recommended the cleaning, so we did it.

It also lives in stagnant water outside. So he had to be kept strictly out of puddles etc.

It does sometimes live in taps - though we were the only case of it the specialist had ever heard of so it's not that common. Still, it's easy to flush hot water thrugh them (at least 15mins worth) and bleach all around the spout - so might be worth doing anyway?

The multiple ear washes were important because pseudo. has a protective slime/film over it that is hard for antibiotics etc to penetrate. The wash (I think the tris-nac) helped break down that film so the next medication could penetrate properly.

It is worth swabbing repeatedly. We found once we cleared pseudo. we had a yeast infection replace it straight away (arrgh!). Luckily, that was easily cleared up. But I'm glad we caught it.

Do also look at (food) allergies. It cropped up as the most common cause of persistent/recurring ear problems so think it must be behind many of them.

Just want to say again I am not a vet - there could be loads more to beating this infection in some dogs that I don't know because we didn't have to do any more than we did. But I know that when we were in the middle of it I felt totally lost and wanted to hear all about other people's experiences - so here I am

It took about a month each time.

I say 'each time' because it took me ages (3 rounds of the above) to deduce it might be in the bloody taps! So we kept getting clear results, stopping treatment and it kept coming back.

It was driving me insane and then I read about pseudo. problems in homes where people with cystic fibrosis lived - because it was such a threat to them. I had my water tested on a whim and - bingo!

Once we used bottled water for drinking water it cleared up for good.

(This meant we were looking for surgical santiser and bottled water last March/April when Covid meant supplies of both were non existent!! Fun times )

Just checked and the flamazine solution used was 10% flamazine and 90% distilled water - presumably so it was runny enough to inject right into the ear canal.

Once we used bottled water for drinking water it cleared up for good.

Sorry, just realised this might not be clear. We only used bottled water during the time we were cleaning and then retesting the taps to confirm they were clear. Took about two weeks because the water company lost some samples and we had to redo them.

This is all so helpful, thank you.

I hear you about the food allergies.
My problem there is that he is a dustbin dog.
So we walk every morning on a nature reserve, off lead for an hour, woods, fields etc, and he will regularly find something to eat.

This morning someone had thrown a whole loaf of bread out for the foxes. We always avoid one part of wood where there is always piles of dog food for the foxes, but we still come across stuff. One day he appeared out of a bush with a whole chicken carcass!

We avoid food for days on end and then he eats poo from cats and dogs.

If I leave the room and any food is on the worksurface within reach, he will steal it. (rare these days, but still happens)
He is a rescue, and the food issues stem from that.
We do go to a lot of trouble the keep him away from random food, but as I said, if no other food is around, he'll eat poo

We have still water in the garden, pond, and a bucket which collects rain water.
There are also loads of puddles of standing water at the nature reserve, it is the flood plain of a little river, so at this time of year loads of standing water in puddles on the fields.

If it is from the water, does he ingest it, or does he get it on his fur and then into his ear?

It gets on the fur and migrates into the ear that way. In drinking water we assumed it was because his droopy ears dunked into the bowl as he drank. Or something like that.

I feel for you. It was such a pita and I didn't have food scavenging to contend with But he like a good roll in fox poo. He had to stay on lead for weeks because I couldn't shower him (avoiding all water) so was frightened of him rolling and being perma-stinky!

It all sounds sp similar, and I am betting that thespecialist would have put us on a similar regime.

So if my vet thinks it might work, I'll ask her if we can try this and if she can prescribe all these things.
he sleeps in kids rooms/on their beds, so I'll have to stop that for the duration as that woudl be too many things to wash! He (and they) won't be happy.