Sunday, July 22, 2007

Pets Can Be Expensive

Earlier this week we found out that our long time cat is diabetic. What can I tell you, fun and games. From this point forward the cat can only eat a special kind of food, and will also require two daily shots of insulin. Never mind all the scratch marks you can now expect to see on our arms on a daily basis, there is also the matter cost.

The insulin shots are expected to cost about $100 per month, and the special food an extra $70. That's a sizable expense. We'll be looking into lower cost sources for the food and medicine, but I am not terribly optimistic.

The funny thing is that we may actually have lucked out. A couple of weeks ago we noticed that our cat was constantly asking for water. This was unusual and I immediately suspected diabetes, given the age of our cat (almost 12) and the fact that excessive drinking is a clear symptom of the disease. My wife took her to the vet, and the diagnosis was confirmed (to the tune of $300). In fact, when we brought her in the vet said that she was borderline - and had her condition been just slightly worse, he would have recommended hospitalizing her. Think $1,000 a day. Can you even imagine? $1,000 a day? What kind of medical system do we have in the U.S. where hospitalizing a cat costs that much? If that's the cost for a cat, what is the cost of hospitalizing a human?

Anyway, we are still not out of the woods. The cat is refusing to eat and drink properly, and until she does, we cannot start the insulin treatment. So, for all I know, next week could cost us several grand in cat emergency care. Such is the price of pets.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The cost of hospitalizing a human is about $10,000/day. I know this because my husband was hospitalized a few years ago, and I remember looking over the ridiculous bills. Thank god for health insurance. If he didn't have it, we would have been out about $400,000.

Is your cat overweight? I heard that too much weight can lead to cat diabetes (just like humans). I keep my cats on a strict diet. They act like they are starving to death all the time, but I am being careful to keep them a healthy weight

Unknown said...

No, she is not over weight. In fact, we have been very good about only feeding her dry cat food all these years, and she is an active / outdoor cat.

I guess it's just one of those things... one of those expensive things.