Help Us Save Kirk
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Meet Kirk.
On January 27th of 2017, my family and I were looking to bring a puppy into our family.
After many years we finally had saved enough money to purchase and properly care for a dog!
There were many beautiful, interesting and even well-behaved little runts, choosing was hard.
But in the end, this happy-go-lucky, mischievous little prince stole our hearts - and so, this barely turned three months old german shepherd, Kirk - Had become the latest member of our family. Not only that, but he was on his way on becoming a Service Dog for my little brother Anthony.
When we first got Kirk he had itchy skin, which the Vets concluded as puppy Pyoderma.
It took a strong medication and for us to bathe him twice a week until his rash cleared, but thankfully within a month he was right as rain.
Kirk also suffered from diarrhea and lack of appetite, something that seemed minor and no one suspected would be the root of all our stress and frustrations to come.
You see, our Vet "did not believe" that there was anything wrong with him.
We brought him multiple times on different occasions for a checkup, twice we even provided fecal matter for the test, yet they refused to take the sample and send it out for examination despite our insistence.
Of course our first idea was a second opinion, but our contract wouldn't cover the costs.
By the beginning of May, Kirk was going to the bathroom every half an hour.
It was then, once Kirk’s problem had become full blown that they decided to send his fecal sample out.
The test came back positive for Giardia, an intestinal parasite which he had likely gotten from the pet store where we bought him.
Thanks to the pointless wait, his intestines and colon had taken plenty of damage, and he was put on countless rounds of Metronidazole and Panacur.
Even then his symptoms did not clear up, so his dosage was increased and his diet changed.
Finally all of this hard work improved his overall quality of his life, but it was short lived as once the treatment had ran its course he quickly declined yet again.
Enter the Miss Congeniality.
In the middle of this ordeal, our regular veterinarian happened to be on vacation, figures.
They did, whoever have a sub in veterinarian to whom we brought Kirk to, as he desperately needed help.
Using her amazing powers of deduction, Sherlock concluded that our dog was not sick and prescribed us the ID diet once more.
Kirk was very clearly sick and we explained, once more, what has been going on since she did not know anything about our dog nor had even looked his previous records.
Unwilling to listen to what we had to say - and going as far as slamming the door on my mother’s face - This monster refused to treat Kirk for we had challenged her honor, after all she worked very hard to learn Instant Diagnosis from the Yardrats.
Moving on, were told to wait until another vet subbed in or until our actual vet came back. (we also found out he had roundworm and that's what the treatment was for despite no one telling us that but there is so much crazy in this whole thing I don't even have a lifetime to describe it all)
So we left the premises empty handed (Or with our hands full of sick-dog-without-treatment, whichever works)
Once home we were greeted by an unexepected call from the front desk, to apolgize and tell us that it would be possible to pick up a medication for him the next day.
And thus, early the next day, we came in again.
Two hours had passed since we first spoke to the reception, and no one would serve us.
Upon asking what was going on, the head receptionist said they would give us probiotics (Which he’s been on since he’s been a puppy) and send us on our way.
It was then, when out of the back room came Vlad the Impaler's nicest cousin, and with her most professional voice said we were disrupting her practice and threatened to call the police on us if we didn’t leave.
Once more front desk apologized and we were told that our actual vet would give us a call.
It Never happened, he still has not called to this day.
..... and with that being said, we decided to switch veterinarians.
No money? No problem!
I looked for the best practice we could take him to in the New York area so that this whole thing would end once and for all.
At this point Kirk has been sick his whole life, and whatever it was that was making him this way, we wanted to find out what it was and cure him, he doesn't deserve this.
The new place was much more professional and polite than our previous experience, the tests were conducted and Kirk was put on medication right away for double the length of time.
It also was suggested we run a full CBC panel of the blood, as well as various other tests to check his pancreas, colon, and intestines.
Due to such expensive medications, and going through with all of these tests we had at that point spent a total of 15,000 dollars on Kirk.
As a Family we have big mortgage on our house and thanks to this roller coaster of bills, now maxed out credit cards
We hoped and prayed that all of his tests would come back okay, not only because we love him so much, but because we were bleeding out and wouldn't be able to afford treatment at this rate for much longer.
The tests came back showing an extreme B12 deficiency, (Most likely from the Giardia) and so weekly vitamin injections were added on to the bill.
Along with the injections and medication Kirk felt better than he ever was before, we were hoping that it would be the end of this nightmare and that our baby would be able to live a normal life.
After the injections and the medication were over, Kirk began to develop diarrhea once more so he was put back on the Metronidazole for a week, it still wasn't enough and another 10 days were added (This is his fifth dosage after just having been on it along with Panacur for 2 weeks straight)
Within a few days of this next round of medication, we were prepping his dinner and Kirk's face began to twitch as he watched us at the counter. I came over to him, thinking maybe he had something in his eye or ears.
He began having a full blown seizure, a terrible one.
He urinated, defecated and threw up all over himself and began to show signs of aggression.
Our Vet was closed, but we were referred to a hospital which instructed us to monitor him within the next 24 hours and rush him to their emergency room if another Seizure would occur.
Unfortunately, less than an hour after his first seizure, he began to have a second one.
We rushed him in and he was put on anti-seizure medication right away in order to stabilize him.
As we waited to see if the medication would be effective, they discussed with us that it would be best if we kept Kirk in their care for 24 hours.
2,700 dollars were added on top of what was spent in order to have him stay the night.
Big Pharma Scam: Pets Expansion Pack.
After a total of 6 seizures Kirk had temporarily gone blind in both eyes.
He most definitely needs to stay at the hospital if he were to have a fighting chance.
We were allowed to see him, he was surrounded by ice and fans because he had also developed a high fever.
But things don't end there.
Our gut feeling pointed towards the medications that he has been on back and forth as the primary cause for this onset of sudden and violent seizures he's never had ever before.
One of many possible listed effects are indeed seizures, and he also had his flea and tic medicine 24 hours before the first seizure which also can cause seizures.
The vets nor the hospital want to acknowledge this as a possibility.
They were (and still are) hellbent on him having epilepsy, they claimed multiple times to have called poison control and that neither of these drugs are capable of causing a seizures, even together.
And that even if they wanted to do the Detox, nobody does that procedure anymore and the wouldn't have the means to do so.
Unfortunately we found out not only they do cause seizures (as was previously stated by the label and dismissed by the hospital) but the very own website of the ASPCA lists these medications as a red flag.
http://www.aspcapro.org/resource/most-common-causes-seizures-dogs
When presented to this, they claimed they would have a meeting and that they called the Pet Breeder (???) to see if there was any history of seisures or illnesses that cause seizures in any of their dogs.
We called the pet breeder and his answer was "no one has ever called me about that"
Now he is worried that they're trying to pin this down on him.
We called AGAIN to tell them this and they claimed to be shocked.
They lied to us and didn't even care to cover their tracks.
The money problem.
We are broke, exhausted, heartbroken and desperate.
If Kirk does have Epilepsy, the hospital told us his medication will be 2000 to 3000 a year, depending on where we pick up his medication from.
We were able to scrape the bottom of the barrel to cover the expenses for tonight.
This whole thing feels like terrible case of malpractice and negligence.
None of this should have happened, he doesn't deseve this.
We have to deal with that, but we are trying everything in our power to just keep Kirk alive right now, for now his seizures have stopped but tomorrow if we don't meet ends he will have to return home.
Upon seeing him at the hosptial, even though he has endured so much, it is very clear that Kirk is very strong and has a very strong will to live.
I'm scared, I truly want my dog, I don’t know what else to do. I do not want him to die becaues I can no longer afford to keep him in the hosptial. This is not only extremely important because we love him so much but because he is also my baby brothers service dog.
If anyone can help us in any way we set up a gofundme, our only goal right now is to keep him stabilized and monitored for another day.
We'll take this one day at a time and see how this goes, no amout of help is too small.
On January 27th of 2017, my family and I were looking to bring a puppy into our family.
After many years we finally had saved enough money to purchase and properly care for a dog!
There were many beautiful, interesting and even well-behaved little runts, choosing was hard.
But in the end, this happy-go-lucky, mischievous little prince stole our hearts - and so, this barely turned three months old german shepherd, Kirk - Had become the latest member of our family. Not only that, but he was on his way on becoming a Service Dog for my little brother Anthony.
When we first got Kirk he had itchy skin, which the Vets concluded as puppy Pyoderma.
It took a strong medication and for us to bathe him twice a week until his rash cleared, but thankfully within a month he was right as rain.
Kirk also suffered from diarrhea and lack of appetite, something that seemed minor and no one suspected would be the root of all our stress and frustrations to come.
You see, our Vet "did not believe" that there was anything wrong with him.
We brought him multiple times on different occasions for a checkup, twice we even provided fecal matter for the test, yet they refused to take the sample and send it out for examination despite our insistence.
Of course our first idea was a second opinion, but our contract wouldn't cover the costs.
By the beginning of May, Kirk was going to the bathroom every half an hour.
It was then, once Kirk’s problem had become full blown that they decided to send his fecal sample out.
The test came back positive for Giardia, an intestinal parasite which he had likely gotten from the pet store where we bought him.
Thanks to the pointless wait, his intestines and colon had taken plenty of damage, and he was put on countless rounds of Metronidazole and Panacur.
Even then his symptoms did not clear up, so his dosage was increased and his diet changed.
Finally all of this hard work improved his overall quality of his life, but it was short lived as once the treatment had ran its course he quickly declined yet again.
Enter the Miss Congeniality.
In the middle of this ordeal, our regular veterinarian happened to be on vacation, figures.
They did, whoever have a sub in veterinarian to whom we brought Kirk to, as he desperately needed help.
Using her amazing powers of deduction, Sherlock concluded that our dog was not sick and prescribed us the ID diet once more.
Kirk was very clearly sick and we explained, once more, what has been going on since she did not know anything about our dog nor had even looked his previous records.
Unwilling to listen to what we had to say - and going as far as slamming the door on my mother’s face - This monster refused to treat Kirk for we had challenged her honor, after all she worked very hard to learn Instant Diagnosis from the Yardrats.
Moving on, were told to wait until another vet subbed in or until our actual vet came back. (we also found out he had roundworm and that's what the treatment was for despite no one telling us that but there is so much crazy in this whole thing I don't even have a lifetime to describe it all)
So we left the premises empty handed (Or with our hands full of sick-dog-without-treatment, whichever works)
Once home we were greeted by an unexepected call from the front desk, to apolgize and tell us that it would be possible to pick up a medication for him the next day.
And thus, early the next day, we came in again.
Two hours had passed since we first spoke to the reception, and no one would serve us.
Upon asking what was going on, the head receptionist said they would give us probiotics (Which he’s been on since he’s been a puppy) and send us on our way.
It was then, when out of the back room came Vlad the Impaler's nicest cousin, and with her most professional voice said we were disrupting her practice and threatened to call the police on us if we didn’t leave.
Once more front desk apologized and we were told that our actual vet would give us a call.
It Never happened, he still has not called to this day.
..... and with that being said, we decided to switch veterinarians.
No money? No problem!
I looked for the best practice we could take him to in the New York area so that this whole thing would end once and for all.
At this point Kirk has been sick his whole life, and whatever it was that was making him this way, we wanted to find out what it was and cure him, he doesn't deserve this.
The new place was much more professional and polite than our previous experience, the tests were conducted and Kirk was put on medication right away for double the length of time.
It also was suggested we run a full CBC panel of the blood, as well as various other tests to check his pancreas, colon, and intestines.
Due to such expensive medications, and going through with all of these tests we had at that point spent a total of 15,000 dollars on Kirk.
As a Family we have big mortgage on our house and thanks to this roller coaster of bills, now maxed out credit cards
We hoped and prayed that all of his tests would come back okay, not only because we love him so much, but because we were bleeding out and wouldn't be able to afford treatment at this rate for much longer.
The tests came back showing an extreme B12 deficiency, (Most likely from the Giardia) and so weekly vitamin injections were added on to the bill.
Along with the injections and medication Kirk felt better than he ever was before, we were hoping that it would be the end of this nightmare and that our baby would be able to live a normal life.
After the injections and the medication were over, Kirk began to develop diarrhea once more so he was put back on the Metronidazole for a week, it still wasn't enough and another 10 days were added (This is his fifth dosage after just having been on it along with Panacur for 2 weeks straight)
Within a few days of this next round of medication, we were prepping his dinner and Kirk's face began to twitch as he watched us at the counter. I came over to him, thinking maybe he had something in his eye or ears.
He began having a full blown seizure, a terrible one.
He urinated, defecated and threw up all over himself and began to show signs of aggression.
Our Vet was closed, but we were referred to a hospital which instructed us to monitor him within the next 24 hours and rush him to their emergency room if another Seizure would occur.
Unfortunately, less than an hour after his first seizure, he began to have a second one.
We rushed him in and he was put on anti-seizure medication right away in order to stabilize him.
As we waited to see if the medication would be effective, they discussed with us that it would be best if we kept Kirk in their care for 24 hours.
2,700 dollars were added on top of what was spent in order to have him stay the night.
Big Pharma Scam: Pets Expansion Pack.
After a total of 6 seizures Kirk had temporarily gone blind in both eyes.
He most definitely needs to stay at the hospital if he were to have a fighting chance.
We were allowed to see him, he was surrounded by ice and fans because he had also developed a high fever.
But things don't end there.
Our gut feeling pointed towards the medications that he has been on back and forth as the primary cause for this onset of sudden and violent seizures he's never had ever before.
One of many possible listed effects are indeed seizures, and he also had his flea and tic medicine 24 hours before the first seizure which also can cause seizures.
The vets nor the hospital want to acknowledge this as a possibility.
They were (and still are) hellbent on him having epilepsy, they claimed multiple times to have called poison control and that neither of these drugs are capable of causing a seizures, even together.
And that even if they wanted to do the Detox, nobody does that procedure anymore and the wouldn't have the means to do so.
Unfortunately we found out not only they do cause seizures (as was previously stated by the label and dismissed by the hospital) but the very own website of the ASPCA lists these medications as a red flag.
http://www.aspcapro.org/resource/most-common-causes-seizures-dogs
When presented to this, they claimed they would have a meeting and that they called the Pet Breeder (???) to see if there was any history of seisures or illnesses that cause seizures in any of their dogs.
We called the pet breeder and his answer was "no one has ever called me about that"
Now he is worried that they're trying to pin this down on him.
We called AGAIN to tell them this and they claimed to be shocked.
They lied to us and didn't even care to cover their tracks.
The money problem.
We are broke, exhausted, heartbroken and desperate.
If Kirk does have Epilepsy, the hospital told us his medication will be 2000 to 3000 a year, depending on where we pick up his medication from.
We were able to scrape the bottom of the barrel to cover the expenses for tonight.
This whole thing feels like terrible case of malpractice and negligence.
None of this should have happened, he doesn't deseve this.
We have to deal with that, but we are trying everything in our power to just keep Kirk alive right now, for now his seizures have stopped but tomorrow if we don't meet ends he will have to return home.
Upon seeing him at the hosptial, even though he has endured so much, it is very clear that Kirk is very strong and has a very strong will to live.
I'm scared, I truly want my dog, I don’t know what else to do. I do not want him to die becaues I can no longer afford to keep him in the hosptial. This is not only extremely important because we love him so much but because he is also my baby brothers service dog.
If anyone can help us in any way we set up a gofundme, our only goal right now is to keep him stabilized and monitored for another day.
We'll take this one day at a time and see how this goes, no amout of help is too small.
Organizer and beneficiary
Ashley Bartels
Organizer
Maspeth, NY
Jeanette Bartels
Beneficiary
