I wanted to ask for help with a 13 year old (according to his previous owner) Golden Retriever named Jake, who Jonny and I rescued today.

His owner was involved in a domestic violence situation and had to abruptly move, could not bring Jake with her, and hasn’t had the ability to take care of him. She contaced a lot of rescues but most of them had a long surrender intake process and she ran out of time. He was posted on Facebook, with a note saying he would be euthanized today if no one could take him. We headed over to get him and didn’t know we would be walking into a much more serious situation for Jake. He was severely infested with fleas, and his toe nails were curling over, along with badly infected nail beds. He has pretty severe skin issues, likely from prolonged exposure to fleas. It could be a form of mange, we aren’t entirely sure. We are not here to pass judgment on his owner and know this was a sad situation for all involved. We are happy Jake is in good hands with us now so we can get him feeling better!

We took him to our vet (Day Heights Vet Clinic) this evening to get him headed in the right direction.

They decided to move forward with the following today:

-Bravecto to treat fleas and potential mange

-Prescription shampoo 1x per week to help his coat grow back

-Antibiotics for infection

-heartworm test and prevention (waiting on results from test, will update when we know if he’s positive or negative)

-rabies vaccine

Next week we will do:

-Skin scrape if there’s no improvement to confirm possible mange. Hopefully his skin is just bad from prolonged exposure to the fleas and he doesn’t have mites!

-Full senior panel of bloodwork to check kidney function, anemia, etc

-X Ray of his infected toe, suspected cancer

-Needle aspiration in toe

-Needle aspiration on tumor on his back side

-Surgery to remove tumor and likely his entire toe if the x ray shows bone cancer

-Neuter while under sedation

-More vaccines when he’s able to tolerate them

As you can imagine, these vet bills are going to pile up and were unexpected. We spent about $350 yesterday for a few things, and surgery alone is going to cost thousands. Getting him bathed weekly by our team of groomers will be time consuming and costly as well.

He had the best spa day ever today with many baths to remove the fleas, along with a paw fizz bath bomb, and some relieving medicated shampoo.

As much as Jonny and I would love to keep him, we are at our dog limit here at the Casey household. Before we find the perfect home for him, we want to make sure he’s as healthy as possible. We really appreciate any donation, no matter how small, to get Jake feeling good.