Embrace Pet Insurance Blog

Happy Mothers Day from your four-legged children

To all the mothers of our furry four legged children, Happy Mother's Day. You know they'd spend every last dime on a bone or a sardine for you if they could - of course, you'd have to share :)

FluffyQuits.com - why you should quit smoking

We all know that second hand smoke hurts the people in the house but did you think about your pets too?

A consortium of veterinary organizations and stop-smoking organizations in the Niagara NY region have banded together to promote Fluffy Quits, which is a program to "educate smokers about the dangers and ramifications associated with smoking around household pets."

I spotted the program on a bill board on the I90 as I drove back and forth from Cleveland to Ontario recently and just love the grassroots activism to promote this little known benefit of quitting smoking.

The website has information of the impact of smoking on pets and encourages pet parents who have recently given up smoking to post pictures of their pets in their Hall of Fame. You can get 5 FluffyBucks certificate to your next visit to the vet and a very strange looking "Smoke Free and So Freakin' Happy" FluffyQuits.com T-shirt for free. Just make the pledge and add your pet to the Hall of Fame (only for NY residents, sorry)

Here are some of the facts on the site:

Q: Is Second Hand Smoke really a big deal in my home?
A: Studies show that the amount of air pollution is on average 8 times higher in homes where smoking is permitted.

Q: What could my pet experience from exposure to Second Hand Smoke?
A: Pets can develop respiratory infections, lung inflammation or asthma when breathing in Second Hand Smoke.

Q: What else should I know about keeping my pet safe from tobacco products?
A: Tobacco, cigarette butts, nicotine replacement products such as patches and gum, chew and other tobacco products are attractive to pets. If eaten, these items could be also be toxic to your pet. Tobacco products should be kept out of reach of pets and disposed of properly.

Update: sadly the website seems to be defunct for now. I'll let you know if it comes back up again :(

Reasons to buy pet insurance - pet food recall now having an impact

I've taken to calling some of our new policyholders to thank them for signing up with Embrace and generally chatting with them about their purchase experience and what they think of their new policies. It keeps my feet on the ground and my eyes and ears open.

I've had some interesting insights into why people picked Embrace, what they didn't like about the competition, and why they considered pet insurance in the first place.

One of the newest reasons I'm hearing for people are buying pet insurance is the prominence of the pet food recall in the news. One woman in Texas said to me that she'd meant to get pet insurance after her previous dog cost her $6,000 with kidney failure (sadly he succumbed to the disease) but she just hadn't got around to it until she kept reading about the pet food recall. Then she knew she had to buy.

Other people just couldn't bear the thought of not being able to afford whatever medical treatment was necessary and yet others focused on the genetic conditions their purebred dog or cat could get.

What reason do you have for buying pet insurance? Let us know.

Other pet insurance stories in the news: March 2007

I've been very busy lately so missed pointing out the most recent high profile stories that mentioned pet insurance (apart from the Today Show mentions I talked about here and here).

The first was Parade Magazine, which is the Sunday newpaper magazine in many newspapers. They had an article on pet insurance and what to look out for.

Is It Worth It? Pet insurance has a lot of fine print, so do your homework (see below). Also, consider the following :

Cost. You easily can spend more than $7,000 on premiums over your pet’s lifetime. But don’t pick a plan based on price alone—the cheapest may not be the best. Usually, lower monthly premiums mean higher deductibles and/or co-payments. Estimate how much you spend a year on veterinary care and how much you ultimately can afford. Some vets feel that pet insurance is best for major expenses or emergencies but not for routine costs, which you could pay out of pocket.

Age. If you insure your pet when he’s young, you won’t have to worry about coverage if he develops a chronic health problem. As your pet ages, the cost of the insurance may rise, and it can be hard to find coverage for dogs and cats older than 8 years.

The other was a piece on NPR The article focused on two types of drugs coming out for dogs from Pfizer – one for dog obesity (Slentrol) and the other to prevent vomiting in motion sickness (Cerenia).   

In the middle of the segment, the reporters talked about the increasing spend on pet care leading to an increase awareness of pet insurance. Slentrol will $2 a day and diabetes treatments for cats run at about $1 a day.

Have you seen or heard other stories on pet insurance? Don't you think it's interesting that the mass media finds pet insurance interesting. You certainly don't see much on dental insurance, do you?

Nominated for a Blogger's Choice Award

Wow, someone who is not related to me, doesn't work for Embrace and in fact, I've never met in my life before actually nominated me for a 2007 Blogger's Choice Award under the Best Animal Blogger award category. What a nice way to end my day at the office.

So, if you feel this blog is worth it, go ahead and vote for the Embrace Pet Insurance blog by clicking on the button above or in the sidebar.

Thanks for your support.

Laura

$4,825 Claim: Dachshund herniates a disc

A 4 year old female Dachshund, Tasha, was found one evening shaking and crying on the basement stairs. Her pet parents could not make her comfortable and her crying persisted, distressing everyone involved.  Over the next couple of days, Tasha showed symptoms of acute onset of pain and whining, she would not climb stairs, jump or play, and had a decreased appetite - she was not herself at all.

The first emergency visit resulted in a prescription for inflammation but this course of treatment did not help very much. Her pet parents knew something more serious was going on and a subsequent visit to her regular vet assured them that Tasha needed to see a specialist where she was diagnosed as having a Intervertebral Disk Herniation. The specialist performed at hemilaminectomy about a week later to resolve the disk herniation (this procedure creates a surgical "sunroof" out of the bone overlying the spinal cord and removes the herniated disc material, relieving pressure on the spinal cord.)

Since her surgery, Tasha has healed very well, and the long scar on her back is slowly being covered by soft, shiny, long black hair again. She was in a lot of pain when she first came home, but she is a happy, frolicking camper now.

Cost of surgery and the related care to date: $4,825.51
Reimbursement: $3,700.42 The annual deductible and co-pay percentage make up the pet owner’s out of pocket expenses.

Policy details:
Annual Premium: $348.70 including a spay/neuter discount of 5% and microchip discount of 5%.
Policy choices made: $200 per year deductible; 20% copay; $10,000 annual maximum; the drugs and dental extension was selected; continuing care extension was selected

Quote from Tasha's pet parents:

Thanks so much for your prompt attention to our claim. She is our baby, and to see her suffer, or to lose her prematurely would have devastated us. Tell the world what a sweet-tempered and loving little creature she is.

Embrace Note: Apart from her wonderful temperament, we have it on good authority that Tasha has the fastest tongue in the West when it comes to kissing. We're glad to bring the kisses back, Tasha.

Other Embrace Pet Insurance claims case studies here.