Paying vet bill when insurance won't

[justtellmee]

I have a puppy who hasn't been well and after various tests it looks like it could be cancer.

She has to have more tests next week.

The problem is, even with lifetime £8k cover the tests and whatnot have come in at nearly £6k already. I'm already having to pay excess and 10% which I can just about cover and this is before next weeks test:

If she needs surgery the insurance won't cover most of it.

What do I do? DH and I don't have any savings at the moment after house renovations then an unexpected bill. We do ok financially but the cost of living crisis has put us in a situation whereby we have no spare cash.

I can't borrow the money from family which leaves a loan? But the repayments would be out of budget at the moment.

We wouldn't t ever qualify for financial help from a charity.

Is there a solution? I'm so worried about her and what we will do. I never anticipated being in such a situation - perhaps that's my mistake - I thought having insurance was the sensible thing.

Is the treatment in the dog’s best interest? How likely is it to be successful? I genuinely don’t know.

sIL’s dog had cancer but she didn’t have it treated, was an older dog though. Dog lived for maybe another year with no treatment before getting to a stage where she needed to be pts.

i’m sorry, horrible situation. But I’d be considering all options, this could be a never ending very expensive situation

If there really is no money or insurance cover then there’s only one sad option.

But also talk to the vet sooner rather than later……are the bills so expensive because they think insurance are paying so they are doing every test going. Are there cheaper options?

Absolutely make sure the vet knows. When my dog needed a small operation that insurance wouldn't cover, the bill suddenly went from £600 to £170.

Yes I second talking to the vet. My dog had cancer recently and I cleverly didn’t insure her because I thought I wouldn’t need it (to be fair, she’s a middle aged dog now and this was the first big expense for her) but when I told them they offered me different options with different costs which was really helpful.

Yes, get costed options from the vet, and also think now about what sort of prognoses you can cope with. How long is the puppy likely to live? How much longer would chemo give her? What would quality of life be like?

And yes of course you did the right thing by having insurance - if you hadn't been able to pay for the tests so far, you would have been putting down a puppy when the cause of illness was unknown, and that can be tough.

Make sure the vet knows she's not insured. Even if they can't bring the price down, they may offer a payment plan for the balance not covered by insurance.

However - is all this surgery, recovery and treatment really in your dogs' best interest or would it be kinder to have her PTS?

Dogs have no concept of mortality and they don't understand that the pain of surgery is for their own benefit. Will she be cancer free after surgery or will she be on medication and treatment for life?

I'm so sorry you're going through this.

Sorry, that should say "make sure the vet knows she's not insured for more than 8k". I haven't had my morning coffee yet!

Firstly, I would speak to the vet and explain the situation. It means that they can prioritise testing.

After that I would be discussing prognosis. If you spend X and it’s curative then that’s different to spending X and having a condition with a poor quality of life or a very poor prognosis.

I would also think about whether lots of treatment is in the best interest of the puppy, sometimes just because you can do something does not mean you always should. I’m not sure I could get into huge debt unless the dog had a chance of a 100% normal life at the end of it sadly.

Thanks everyone. I will talk to vets. Thing is she's got our local vet and referral place an hour away she has to go for the tests. They do know the insurance level but I will certainly talk it over.

We need this test to see if it is treatable or not and then depending on that I will look at quality of life and how much the treatment will make her suffer.

I'm devastated for her. I'm worried about telling 10yo DS who adores her, this is his first much wanted dog.

Some vets will let you pay it up, not all, it depends whether they’re set up for it or not as it’s effectively a credit plan.

If they can delay stuff till the next insurance year, or do something cheaper but temporary till then they will do.