Jim Timber
Veteran Member
My biggest anti-depressant pill needs his eye fixed and it's not something I can swing the payments on. I've got a Fb fundraiser going, and that's doing OK, but seems to have stalled out at about 1/3 the needed funds. I've also got some friends helping by over-paying for some of my excess stuff (in the name of charity), but I'm a bit short on stuff to sell off that's in the charitable auction realm of price ranges and not actually owned for business purposes (gotta keep up with the mortgage, etc). So I'm wondering if anyone knows of organizations specifically set up to help with veterinary bills?
I'm not going to post the Fb fundraiser link here because I don't know if that's cool or not. PM me if you'd like it.
Vinnie was picked up by animal control in Feb of '17, spent 5 months in a cage after a no-kill saved his life in Ocala, FL. Came to MN in early July, then spent a month on pain meds after being treated for heartworms he tested positive for when in-processed at the no-kill but they didn't have money to treat. He's got a traumatic cataract in his right eye, and cannot see through it at all. His iris is fully functional and reacts to looking out a bright window from indoors just like his un-affected left eye, so we're hopeful that recovery will be a success once the cloudy lens is removed/replaced. No one wanted him because the cost of the procedure is $3K.
My vet seemed less-than-concerned with the cataract as long as it was stable (how can you tell when he can't see anything out that eye?), and was nonchalant about "when you want to get it fixed, let me know and I'll give you a referral". I was at a friends memorial service (he died of cancer at 68), and one of his friends was a research veterinarian at the University of Minnesota Med School doing the clinical trial management. He was more concerned about Vinnie's long-term prognosis and started talking about delays in treating the eye leading to further complications stemming from the injury and could result in detachment of the optical nerve all the way to requiring the eye itself be removed. :thumbdown: That conversation led me to doing some more research on the options and deciding that it wouldn't be the right thing to do to delay care until it was more financially feasible for us (that could be years). So I've decided to reach out for help instead.
Vinnie's my buddy and helped me come through a pretty rough stretch of depression, which I've been dealing with since being med-boarded out of the Army in 2001. Saying I owe him my life is a bit of a stretch, but he brightens my days more than the sun more often than not. I want to do right by my buddy and get him proper care. He's relatively well-adapted to being one-eyed otherwise. He still runs into things because he doesn't know how close they are, and he can't play catch at all (tossing treats at him results in them hitting him in the face and then he picks them up off the floor :licking: ); otherwise he's a healthy active 3yr old pup who seems pretty happy to be living with us now after spending 1/4 of his life prior to our taking him in, in a kennel. Poor guy's been through enough.
![20180131_114206-1[1].jpg](https://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/data/attachments/499/499955-eeea61e9720de78a7326ba1d5cc590b6.jpg "20180131_114206-1[1].jpg")
I'm not going to post the Fb fundraiser link here because I don't know if that's cool or not. PM me if you'd like it.
Vinnie was picked up by animal control in Feb of '17, spent 5 months in a cage after a no-kill saved his life in Ocala, FL. Came to MN in early July, then spent a month on pain meds after being treated for heartworms he tested positive for when in-processed at the no-kill but they didn't have money to treat. He's got a traumatic cataract in his right eye, and cannot see through it at all. His iris is fully functional and reacts to looking out a bright window from indoors just like his un-affected left eye, so we're hopeful that recovery will be a success once the cloudy lens is removed/replaced. No one wanted him because the cost of the procedure is $3K.
My vet seemed less-than-concerned with the cataract as long as it was stable (how can you tell when he can't see anything out that eye?), and was nonchalant about "when you want to get it fixed, let me know and I'll give you a referral". I was at a friends memorial service (he died of cancer at 68), and one of his friends was a research veterinarian at the University of Minnesota Med School doing the clinical trial management. He was more concerned about Vinnie's long-term prognosis and started talking about delays in treating the eye leading to further complications stemming from the injury and could result in detachment of the optical nerve all the way to requiring the eye itself be removed. :thumbdown: That conversation led me to doing some more research on the options and deciding that it wouldn't be the right thing to do to delay care until it was more financially feasible for us (that could be years). So I've decided to reach out for help instead.Vinnie's my buddy and helped me come through a pretty rough stretch of depression, which I've been dealing with since being med-boarded out of the Army in 2001. Saying I owe him my life is a bit of a stretch, but he brightens my days more than the sun more often than not. I want to do right by my buddy and get him proper care. He's relatively well-adapted to being one-eyed otherwise. He still runs into things because he doesn't know how close they are, and he can't play catch at all (tossing treats at him results in them hitting him in the face and then he picks them up off the floor :licking: ); otherwise he's a healthy active 3yr old pup who seems pretty happy to be living with us now after spending 1/4 of his life prior to our taking him in, in a kennel. Poor guy's been through enough.
