Putting a cat to sleep rather than expensive treatment

[outofofficeagain]

This is a hypothetical question really, but my cat is getting on in years and was discussing with DH.

A friend of ours is paying over a hundred pounds a month for her cat's treatment. Their cat is too old to be covered on insurance (or insurance was too expensive).

The cat is 13. I said to DH that if that was our cat, I'd let her go rather than prolong her life with expensive treatment, especially if her quality of life was impacted or she was in pain.

DH said we'd probably pay too.

I think that there is a huge difference between putting a suffering pet to sleep and discarding an animal because it is a financial inconvenience. We shouldn't be adopting animals if we don't want to commit to caring for them for their lives.

We had to give one of ours injections. It was covered by injections, but it was bloody awful for all involved. She died age 9, although we're not entirely sure how old she really was. She'd been passed around a lot before us.
The other developed lymphoma and went down rapidly within weeks. We had to have her pts because it seemed cruel to put her through treatment. Mind you, I'm also all for the right to die at any age and any point for humans too, so I'm possibly a little more on the pragmatic side. Having said that, we probably dithered a bit too long with our 3rd cat, who quite possibly lived longer than he would have liked.

Dh is very soft over the cats, but he's also realistic when it comes to the costs.

I would pay as long as my cat/dog wasn’t suffering when taking the medication. I’d give the shirt off my back if they were happy and living a good life. I agree with other posters - it’s about quality of life. My pets are family and I made a commitment to them when I got them. That’s how I see it anyway.

Yes, I think I agree. If it made them well and their quality of life was good, then I would.

It's not about the financial inconvenience, more about whose benefit is it for really, if the cat is struggling.

Hopefully we won't have to think about it for a while yet, by which point I might feel completely different.

Given that many people spend way more on their car per month, £100 isn't bad if the cat is otherwise happy and has a good quality of life.

We had our 16 year old boy pts in the summer as his quality of life had massively deteriorated very rapidly after years of well managed kidney disease.

Every pet owner knows when their pet's time has come to say goodbye.

I would spend it on a thirteen year old cat with a decent prognosis. If the outlook wasn't as good, even with the treatment, I'd be reluctant to pursue it for more than a few months. If the condition was something like the aggressive oral carcinoma one of our cats had, then not a chance, but the calculation wouldn't be money, it would be how much the cat would suffer (and me too, watching it happen.) I would put limits on treatment, but not on sparing my beloved cat pain, if that makes sense.

If the cat has a condition that can be well managed by treatment then we would do that. I had an elderly cat with awful arthritis and a thyroid issue. With medication she was fine. If the medication hadn’t given her a decent quality of life then we would have had to PTS. And if cost is an issue then keep up the insurance.

On mymsnet, there is sometimes an attitude that you should disregard cost.

I'm pretty lucky, in that I can afford most things in vet care, so cost doesn't really change things for me.

However, I think it is OK for someone who can't afford it, especially in an older animal, to be swayed to pts on the basis of cost ( Obviously there are a lot of shades of grey here)

I think being able to afford an animal means affording basic medical care, not going all out on costs.

(Edited in brackets)

It would depend what it was. Multi££££ surgery- possibly not. Ongoing medication that is non invasive and improves their quality of life- if I could afford it I would.
13 isn't (or shouldn't be) that old for a cat if it is well looked after and fed a decent diet, our family cats lived from I think between 15 and 22 years. I would base it on health not age, and I'd the treatment is painful or invasive rather than costs.

I wouldn't pay £100 a month ongoing for potentially 10 years, I just couldn't justify taking that money from my dc. I would be very sad and would ensure that the cat went to sleep with dignity.

For me it's about quality of life. When my dog was elderly and became ill the vet said it's not so much what we can do, it's more what we should do. That's an incredibly difficult thing to call.

I pay more than that for my much older cat's medication. He's got a great quality of life, and we're definitely not thinking about having him put to sleep to save money.

There is a ceiling for us of how much we could pay in this hypothetical situation and if the cost reached our financial ceiling we would have to opt for our loved pet to be PTS. I don’t feel bad about that.

We only have the income we have - more than enough to keep and care for a pet and cover regular basic medical needs but not for unusual, long term or more sophisticated / involved medical treatment for diagnoses such as cancer. That’s ok and not immoral. It’s just realistic.

We just had our beloved 14 year old pts after 6 months of diabetes medication (about £100 a month) that just didn’t seem to be suiting him, despite the vets saying his results were good. Had he still seemed to be living a reasonable life we’d have kept going.

My 14 year old was diagnosed with a growth on his bladder and I was offered surgery to remove the growth which would have cost £1500 to £2000. They didn't know whether the growth was cancer or not or how successful it would be.

I was in two minds about whether or not to give him the surgery but ultimately cost was the deciding factor for me.

He had to be PTS less than a fortnight later when his bladder blocked.

Mine are 16 and might have hyperthyroidism, they have just had the blood tests. They are still healthy at the moment and have a good quality of life and I will certainly be giving them the meds if they need it, though if they had something which made them very ill that would be a more difficult decision. I had one cat who had toilet issues in her old age and was deaf, I had to gently wash her and dry her with the towel and hair dryer (which she could no longer hear). She still enjoyed food and cuddles. We only had her PTS when she seemed to give up and stop eating, and she was 19 then.

My personal view is that if the pet tolerates the treatment well and has a good quality of life on it, then it’s worthwhile. I have a fuzzy rule that if they develop a big condition and it’s incurable, then they get as much as their insurance will pay for. After that, I’ll pay out of pocket for quality of life medicine and euthanise when they deteriorate.

It helps keep things sensible I think. One cat has had about 3k out of pocket on dental surgery (insurance decided the bad teeth were preexisting, ouch), she also just developed a long term condition and needs £30 a month medication that we just buy outright since it isn’t worth the insurance excess. Now that she’s toothless and on the right pills, she’s a very happy cat and should have another 10 or so years with us. Worth every penny.

On the other hand, her brother burned through his entire insurance budget in 2 months with a mystery illness that turned out to be a really odd presentation of cancer. At that point, with a grim prognosis and little in the way of good treatment options, he got a couple of months on steroids and painkillers and was then euthanised when the illness caught up with him. As heartbreaking as it was and even though we could have stretched to afford it, we couldn’t justify spending a massive amount on an invasive treatment that would bring him at best another couple of months with a questionable quality of life. I miss him so much, but the harsh reality is that no amount of money could have saved him in the end.

Until you are in the situation you don’t know what you would do. I was always saying wouldn’t likely to pay huge sums of money …I ended up twice paying the money.

For each cat it was once their quality of life affected. One cat loved being outside and hated hated being kept in the tipping point was that. Not an easy decision though - honestly I thought it would be until you have to make it.

It depends on the condition and what the impact of the money spent would be for the wider family.

If a treatment would mean a year or two more of pain free good quality life then generally I would say pay unless the expense woukd mean being unable to afford to eat or make rent.

If paying would leave humans hingry or unable to have the heating on in cold weather or make living circumstances precarious then it is ok not to pay

If treatment would just mean a longer existence in pain and unable to live life to the full then it is ok not to pay

When we had a 16yo cat with a massive growth in the abdomen we didn't embark on treatment because the probability of eventual healthy thriving life being eventually restored was very slim and only even a potential outcome after many months ir years of painful and upsetting treatment that the cat wouldn't understand.

13 is young!

Honestly setting that money aside each month while she’s healthy is a good idea.

It’s not a lot of money and then you have some savings.

I spent a lot of money on my 14 year old cat, and would have continued to do so if a procedure he had done hadn't stuffed his kidneys. I would never put a loved pet to sleep if they still had a good quality of life because of how much their treatment cost. I also spent thousands on a young cat, and he had another 12 or so good years of life, and spent a lot on a epileptic dog and a diabetic cat over several years. They are part of the family, and deserve to be treated as such.

This.

We get pets knowing they will probably die before we will. As responsible owners we plan for predictable expenses, including routine medical care and a reserve/insurance for some non-routine/emergency.

But it isn't an open ended commitment, it can't be. Unless you are saying no-one should own a pet unless they are willing to become bankrupt.

Obviously the ideal in the hypothetical situation would be to rehome to the posters saying that they don't allow ((or need to consider) financial realities to affect their care for their pets.

it is subjective
£100 might not be much to some but it might make a huge difference to other people's budget
you do what is right for your circumstances

I think it depends on what is wrong with the cat and how much people can afford to pay. My cat is 17 with hyperthyroidism and arthritis. He has twice daily medication for one and a monthly injection for the other. He takes the daily medication in his food quite happily and doesn’t seem too distressed with the monthly vet visits. Both treatments have made a massive difference to him and he’s back to his old self. He’s currently insured so I only pay a small amount, but I’m fairly sure the price is going to shoot up at the next renewal. Luckily I’ll be able to afford his treatment regardless, approx £200 per month, and as long as he’s thriving, I’ll be happy to pay it.