Meeko’s road to healing
Within a month of Meeko’s adoption, the sweet and gentle two-year-old cat excitedly ran out of the front door when an in-home caretaker for the family came for a visit. Tragically, Meeko was hit by a car and was badly hurt. She was taken to a local emergency veterinary clinic immediately.
The clinic spent days helping the cat recover. As was expected and communicated, the cost was thousands of dollars in stabilization care. Requiring sedation due to extreme pain, her treatment included frequent bandage changes, pain and infection control, and inflammatory control for its torn cruciate ligament and severe thigh degloving wounds.
Meeko’s owner had exhausted their reserve income, borrowed money from family, and was already living paycheck to paycheck. Multiple discussions of amputation were had primarily due to financial concerns. Jacob Lauer, DVM, of Riverside Animal Hospital, knew that the pet could and would heal. However, treatment was delayed for weeks, complicating healing time and prognosis.
Traditional loan/credit applications, clinic provisions, and resources were either exhausted or not feasible for this owner. Not wanting to see this pet get refused by rescue, foster, shelter, or be euthanized due to unexpected sudden hardship, Dr. Lauer decided to rewrite the script and modernize how people see charity, community, and veterinary medicine. Dr. Lauer shares, “It’s been amazing how this has brought the family together. Now, I would like to see it bring our community together.” He hopes to inspire Green Bay, Wisconsin…and the world.
“The AVMF REACH Program™ has helped us treat deserving patients and clients in new ways not before possible. Being able to inform a client who is struggling with severe financial difficulty and a sick pet, that they will be taken care of is such a blessing. I’ll never forget the generosity of this program, the client’s gratitude, and tears of joy as we see hope for a loved one return,” Dr. Jacob Lauer.
The AVMF REACH Program™ exists to help veterinarians provide the best care for all animals, at any time and in any town. We can’t do it without the generous gifts from those who want the best for all animals, regardless of their owner’s financial means. If you’d like to support this program with a tax-deductible gift, select “AVMF REACH Program” from the “I want to support” dropdown menu on the gift form.
Thank you for helping us REACH as many animals in need as possible!
This program is supported in part by PURINA through the ProPlan Veterinary Support Mission.