Pet Insurance may be a good option

If you didn’t already know, recently I got diagnosed with a meningioma and my brother, Nutty, got diagnosed with a hemangioma on the same day!  It was a crazy couple of weeks!  You can read about it HERE.  

I had a MRI, CT, and 3 rounds of Cyberknife radiation and my brother had his spleen taken out.  As you can imagine, these treatments were not cheap.   Mommy has spent close to $19,000. on me and Nutty’s mom has spent close to $4,000. on him.  

Mommy has been doing a lot of research on cancer in dogs and she is even on the board of the Morris Cancer Foundation’s 5k walk next year in April.   

What she has found out is that the statistics are not good!  One in two dogs are getting diagnosed with cancer and one in four are dying from it.   It is really sad and terrifying.   But, DON’T give up hope.  I am a perfect example of how sometimes cancer can be treated and us dogs will still continue to have fun!  

What you may want to consider is purchasing pet insurance.  Many of my friends have it and it covers a lot of the vet expenses.  My friend, Murphy the Great Dane, got osteosarcoma a few years back and his mommy had pet insurance and it covered a lot of his expenses.  Now she is doing research  for her new dog, Lira the Lagotto and so far Nationwide is winning with the best coverage that includes wellness.  

Depending on what you want and you can use this comparison chart  that she made to see for yourself since everyone’s needs and budget are different.   

You may even check with your work, many unions and companies are offering pet insurance to their employees now.  Mommy just found out that her union at UCSD offers it!  

There are a lot of questions to ask when purchasing insurance and there are many different providers to choose from.   

A few sites that you can go to that will let you compare the different plans are  Epetsure.com and Pet Insurance Review.com.   They will do a lot of the homework for you. 

Some of the things that you may want to consider are:  

• How much of a deductible do you want to have? This will affect your monthly premium. Higher deductible = Lower monthly payment
• The age and breed of your pet may impact how much the monthly premium will cost. Older pets are more expensive to insure, and some breeds are prone to more health conditions
• Your zip code will affect your premiums. 
• Do you want coverage for injury and accident only or do you want wellness included? There’s often an additional cost to including wellness (vaccines, spay/neuter, dental, flea meds). There is also often a limit to how much that “wellness” coverage will pay on a wellness claim.
• Is that deductible per “Incident” or an annual deductible? If it’s a per incident deductible, that means you have to meet that amount every time you have a new incident within the policy year. Example: In January your pet has diarrhea and is diagnosed with gastroenteritis. Your coverage begins after you’ve paid your deductible. In March, your pet has an ear infection that needs treatment. This is a separate incident and has it’s own deductible you will need to meet. 
• Does the insurance pay based on the veterinary invoice or a benefits schedule (what they think your vet should charge you based on their research)
• Are there exclusions that won’t be covered based on the breed of your pet?
• Once you sign up for coverage, is there a waiting period before the coverage will begin? Most companies begin coverage  for accidents the very next day. Your state might have a waiting period for illness to be covered (CA wait period is 14 days for an illness claim). Some policies have 6 months to year before a knee, disc or hip claim would be covered. Some companies will waive that waiting period after an orthopedic exam is complete and your vet confirms your pet is healthy.

Pet insurance may be a way to save your dogs life in the event that you can not afford costly treatment.  You can budget the monthly cost instead of getting hit all at once with a gigantic vet bill.   Cyberknife was a better option for me, even though it was more expensive.  If mommy would have had pet insurance,  most likely,  it would have been covered.  

CBS 8 news did a a segment on us and we talked about being ready financially if something happens to your dog, you can watch it HERE.   If you decide to not get insurance then PLEASE start saving your money in case something happens to your beloved pet.  I am lucky cause my mommy is a good saver.  

We would love to hear from you in the comments below.   What pet insurance do you have and do you like it?  If you want, you can share how much it costs so people have an idea.  

Thanks for reading and learning with us.  We are going to let you know which essential oils are helping me so stay tuned, remember that you can subscribe and get our blogs in your email in the upper right…..