Fleas stink. No doubt about it. They make your pet miserable, you miserable, they carry parasites, and they’re gross. Worse still, once they take up residence in your home, they can be very difficult to get rid of.
Why is that?
My childhood dog was a Lhasa Apso named Taffy. For the first 8 months of life on the East Coast, she was an adorable ragamuffin of flopsy adorableness. Then- we moved to California.
In the warm Southern California climate, flea season is year round. And over the next few months, Taffy became Scrappy. Her long lustrous fur fell out, to be replaced with that hyperlichenified elephant skin indicative of massive irritation. Her skin was one raw welt.
The only way to keep her comfortable was to shave her short like a rat, dose her up on steroids like a Mr. Olympia wannabe, and routinely smoke out the house with nasty-smelling flea bombs probably just as bad for us as they were for the fleas.
Then Advantage came out.
I will tell you, and I will stand by it until the day I die, that dental cleanings are an extremely important and helpful measure in keeping your pet healthy. My teeth are white. My gums aren’t red. My teeth aren’t falling out of my head. And I still get cleanings twice a year. Visible disease is not the only sign your mouth needs care.
Every once in a while, someone will come in a few months after a cleaning and point out the fact that there is, again, some visible plaque. “How come?” they ask. “Why aren’t the teeth still pearly white?”
As many of you already know, February is National Pet Dental Health Month. Do your pet a favor and take a few seconds to take a peek at his or her teeth- a GOOD peek. You might be surprised at what you find.
According to many veterinarians (including this one), periodontal disease is the most commonly diagnosed disease in dogs and cats. According to Dr. Brook Niemiec, “By the age of just two, 80% of dogs and 70% of cats have some form of periodontal disease.” As a board certified veterinary dental specialist, he knows what he’s talking about.
There’s a double whammy with dental disease- not only is it pervasive, it’s sneaky. Sometimes the signs are obvious- painful eating, bad breath, obvious tartar and plaque accumulation. But most of the time that is not the case. It takes a thorough physical examination and usually sedation to truly understand the state of your pet’s mouth.
Here are three things to do in order see if your pet is one of the 80% with some form of dental disease:
Kim asked me what I think about pet insurance. Me? I love it. It means people who would normally be unable to afford an emergency surgery or illness are able to get their pet treatment.
Most veterinary clinics don’t offer payment plans. We all wish we could. The problem is not that we don’t want to deal with it, but that they never work. There are too many people who renege on it and ruin it for everyone else, so the only way we can stay in business is to be paid at the time of services rendered. Insurance has saved many lives.
The other reason I like it is actually something most owners probably dislike. I really don’t have anything to do with it. There is none of that craziness human MDs have to deal with, no coding and negotiated reimbursements and arguing with medical billers. You pay, you fill out the papers, you get reimbursed. I just sign off on what we did.
The disadvantage to that is of course that you still have to have the money available to pay, even though you are reimbursed. I can’t speak as to the positives and negatives of individual companies since I don’t work with them much at all, but I know I have heard some grumblings about reading fine print. Be very aware of the exclusions- many insurance companies have a list of breed related conditions they will not pay to treat, regardless of its medical indications.
I’m not sure how beneficial it is for preventive care, but I see its greatest value in emergency treatment and catastrophic illness. If I didn’t have this job already, I would definitely be looking into it. The feedback I have heard is definitely quite positive as a whole.
Anyone here have pet insurance? What do you think of it? Would you do it again?
I had a request to cover the topic of FIV in cats and what someone who was considering adopting such a cat needs to know.
First of all, anyone who adopts a special-needs pet has an extra special place in heaven. 
Always good to accumulate good karma.
Here are the basic things you need to know (which I have summarized from the excellent article at Veterinary Partner: )
1. FIV (or feline immunodeficiency virus) is not an automatic death sentence. The average life expectancy from the time of diagnosis is 5 years. Many infected cats live long and full lives.
2. People cannot get FIV from cats and vice versa. That being said, people who are immunocompromised themselves should not adopt a FIV+ cat.
3. FIV requires a pretty substantial type of contact to be transmitted. The most common route of transmission is a bite, the type most common to outdoor male cats. Brawlers. Frat boy types. You can have other cats in the house with an FIV+ cat as long as they don’t fight. For obvious reasons, FIV+ cats should be kept indoors- for their own safety and that of other cats.
Those are the main salient points, but the original article goes into quite a bit more detail. There is also a link to a fantastic info sheet from the Cornell College of Veterinary Medicine.
I hope you do consider one of these great kitties! Does anyone else have experience with owning a FIV+ cat (or for that matter, FELV?) Do you have other cats? How did you handle it?
PRIZE ALERT: Sick kitties (and well ones! And people! And dogs!) love blankies. My friend and amazing seamstress Lisa has donated one custom made blankie to the cause. I don’t have a picture for you, but they are soft and yummy and I know you want one.
To win it, hmmm, let’s do a cat question. At what age do kittens typically open their eyes?
