Help Wally Keep Fighting!

My best friend from Cal Poly, Riva Martin,  got the little bundle of joy pictured below in August of 2019, shortly after her mom passed away.

 

 

 

Shortly after getting Wally, she noticed he would get tired often and that he didn’t have as much of that puppy energy as she was expecting. After a visit to the vet, Wally was diagnosed with Tetralogy of Fallot at only 2 months old. A rare condition caused by a combination of four heart defects that are present at birth. Tetralogy of Fallot defects cause oxygen-poor blood to flow out of the heart and into the rest of the body.

 

Wally was originally given less than a year prognosis, but is almost 2.5 years old now.

 

From the day of his diagnosis, Riva has invested most of her resources to giving Wally the best chance at living and the best quality of life to ensure his expected short life sentence was lived to the absolute fullest. This has included lots of love and a dedicated team of specialists at UC Davis that Riva drives Wally to periodically from Medford, Oregon.

 

Despite his early diagnosis, Wally has beat the odds and is a relatively normal dog. He has shown his true fighting spirit by surpassing all of his expected “only has ____ months to live” dates.

 

 

(Wally on his second birthday pictured above)

 

His Tetralogy has been static, and at his most recent appointment, Riva’s investment showed to have paid off because Wally’s team at UC Davis gave him a very positive prognosis and said he could live up to 5 years, if Tetralogy continued to be his only ailment.

 

However, last week, things unexpectedly became rather complicated for Wally. He was not acting his usual self and was hospitalized after contracting a heart valve infection that has now spread throughout his body. He will need to be at UC Davis for the rest of this week and will require months of subsequent antibiotics.

 

This new treatment, on top of the expenses of his previous (also costly) monthly treatment for his Tetralogy will add up quickly, but Riva is willing to pay if it gives Wally a chance.

On top of the needed continued treatments , things get more complicated because at the moment Wally has already almost amassed a vet bill of $10,000 just for his current stay to stabilize him and plan out the next steps of his medical journey. This total does not include Riva’s lodging fees for being away from her current home in Oregon and staying near Davis to visit Wally daily.

 

 

 

Due to the current vet bill that is continuing to grow, it’s hard to see how it will be possible to pay off the current vet bill and also continue to pay the monthly treatments.

 

Riva is now having to face the difficult reality of whether or not it is justifiable to continue to invest so much money for his vet stay to help give Wally a continued fight at life.

Unfortunately because he was diagnosed so young, no pet insurance will help cover his bills.

 

Today, he was able to go on a walk and still give lots of love. His team believes he still has a lot of fight left to give but financially Riva and Wally will need help to pay for his current growing vet bill and to help offset the costs of his continued monthly treatments.

 

Let’s help Wally live to see 5 years old and grow old, because he hasn’t fought this long to have to lose to a new infection and costly vet bills.