PLEASE insure your pups

[gemy]

My dear Yorkie owners new to this Forum

This is an appeal to you to get pet insurance for your Yorkie or your Yorkie mix, now prior to an emergency happening.

Why you ask? Well one of the most distressing things we read here time after time are sick Yorkies whose owners do not have the financial wherewithal to care for a sick pup. Just go to the Sick and Emergency forum to see all the threads on this.
This is not a pain you want to suffer - to have as your only recourse PTS your beloved dog due to a simple lack of financial funds.

Look at the top Health concerns for Yorkies, which shares some very broad brush strokes on costs of certain health conditions. http://www.yorkietalk.com/forums/die...p-10-list.html

Now some of you will think that well if I put $X into savings every month without fail, then I will have my kitty put aside just in case of an issue.

But what if there are two or three conditions or emergencies will you truly have the resources to meet them? And then what? Your kitty is at zero, how will you save $$$ for their senior years when health problems are also likely to occur?

These are sobering thoughts that an informed potential pet owner should consider very seriously before embarking on the joy and the (pain) of owning a Yorkie.

[jp4m2]

This is a chart with most of the companies to compare benefits from March 2013....

http://veterinarybusiness.dvm360.com...64/article.pdf


The Consumer Reports has these tips from 2011:

*Download and read the company's sample policy, including its terms and conditions. Watch for limitations, cost-sharing, and service fees. Most policies require deductibles, co-pays, or both. Look for coverage with simple, percentage-based payouts and no reliance on judgments of what's "reasonable."

*Watch for what's excluded. No pet insurance covers pre-existing conditions. Carriers often exclude hip dysplasia, a chronic malady. QuickCare Gold won't cover any illness claims for Chinese shar-peis or their crossbreeds, though it will cover accidents. VPI has its own long list of excluded conditions. Some insurers will exclude a newly diagnosed ailment when the policy is renewed or charge you more to avoid such exclusions. An insurer also might impose a maximum limit on treatment for individual illnesses, or on the yearly or lifetime reimbursement.

*Avoid riders for wellness care, which we found are generally not worth the price.

* If you plan to use the insurance for catastrophic coverage—say, $1,000 and up—go for the highest deductible you can comfortably afford.

*Don't be caught off guard by premium increases, which can vary by state. Insurers may base their hikes on a pet's age, veterinary cost inflation, or other factors. Trupanion, the company that performed best overall in our New York example here and in our test with the two cats, recently raised its premiums an average of 52 percent in parts of California. The company, which projects payouts of 69 cents of every dollar collected, says it adjusts premiums according to veterinary inflation and the scope of available treatments.

[107barney]

I think that insurance is an individual decision. For years, I was against it, and for the most part, I'm still playing the odds. I did purchase a catastrophic type small policy last year on my younger dogs to take the stress off of emergencies. I also recently applied for and was approved for care credit. I want to be able to float certain bills without dipping into savings or depleting my paychecks as I have in the past for sick pets. If I were purchasing a new puppy today, I would not structure it as a catastrophic type of plan because too much could be discoverable in the first year or so where a lower deductible and more comprehensive coverage might be more sensible.

[My lil friend]

A reason for insurance. .. in March Mina became ill with tummy issues. 3 vet visits in 5 days, $700. $600 returned to me. Two weeks later Skittles became ill. 1 vet visit, $500 . No insurance on this 12 yr old poodle, no $$ returned to me. I also keep a fund and we have care credit.

[gemy]

I purchased a plan with my new puppy, that covers genetic types of conditions such as HD and ED, with no life time limits of coverage on each condition diagnosed, how-ever my deductible is per condition. So if there are 3 different conditions diagnosed, my deductible is applied newly to each condition. But other illnesses that are linked to a diagnosed problem would also be covered and come under the original deductible.
All meds are covered, and I purchased a separate rider for other types of treatments.

Trupanion states that my premiums won't go up as my puppy ages, but yes their premiums will be adjusted for vet costs with=in my area.

She is also covered in case of accidents - ie when we are travelling, but only in Canada, USA and Mexico, not Europe or other parts of the world.

I hope that she never needs any of her coverage and I gladly pay monthly the premiums.

[connie3dogs]

I have all my dogs insured. One of my irish setters suffered boloat and gastric torsion 3 times in 8 months and required emergency surgery on each episode, thankfully she survived each major abdominal surgery. All were insured with petplan, however when I came to insure the baby of the family ( Lou Lou's pup) at 8 weeks I mentioned that she had 1 episode of colic at 10 days old . They wanted to put an exclusion on the policy for any gastic/abdominal problems for 12 months. I decided not to go with petplan with the baby as after discussion with my vet he thought it outrageous for them put that exclusion in. One other fact was that the premiums for petplan have escalated over the years. I now pay about £2000 a year for my pets insurance but I reckon it is worth it. When Sophie had bloat/torsion the vet fees were about £6000 in 8 months.


Shirl