Walter's Total Ear Canal Ablation Surgery (TECA)

Hello everyone, this is Walter, my sweet baby boy we rescued at 6 months old after having been abused, neglected, and malnourished.

When we first got him, both ears were severly infected, his right eye was infected, (which affected his vision) along with a majority of his body being covered with ringworm and sores.. To top it all off, he was severly underweight for his age, and our Veterinarian says Walter's growth may be stunted due to the effects of the malnutrition.

When we brought him home he was so afraid, he would hide from us and wasn’t used to being held, groomed, or even FED.

He didn’t know how to drink water, and had to be hand-fed sometimes to understand that his food, indeed, was his own! We nursed him back to health enough to gain his trust and to clear up one of his ear infections along with all of his sores and eye infection. Because he is a rescue AND because of his stunted growth, we're unsure exactly how old he is, but his Veterinarian estimates about 1 year as of now since he has started to gain the normal Sphynx cat brown staining to his teeth.

For all of his life, he's known nothing but pain and discomfort. Please help me save my baby, I just want to show him how life can be without that constant ear pain. The photo below is when we first rescued our sweet boy, and as you can see, he’s been fighting all of his life and we just want him to be able to live a happy and healthy little life full of love in our arms. He’s been traumatized enough, we just want him to be okay.

 

We've been taking him to a veterinarian consistently since then, and now we're faced with the reality of his condition worsening. Although his facial lesions have healed, and he is now at a healthy weight, the one thing that persists are the reocurring infections in his left ear. We've exhausted all treatment options, except surgery. Walter has gone from drops in his ears, to oral antibiotics, to antibiotic injections, and now back to the drops to let his immune system rest a bit.

Walter used to tilt his head to the left a lot, we thought it was a cute quirk but soon learned it was because he was already starting to lose his hearing in that ear. Now that the hearing is gone completely, he doesn't tilt his head as much but his left ear is still afflicted with pain and pus and constant discomfort.

(pics below of Walter's tilt)

We've found a veterinarian about an hour from us who has explained this procedure, the recovery time, what aftercare will look like, and the only part we're struggling with is the cost.

Most of the pricetag comes from the CT Imaging required for the veterinarian to see what they're doing in the very small spaces of his ear canal. From what's been explained to me, without this CT, going in blind would end up causing major damage to the already very damaged parts of Walter's ear. (think about how hard it is to drive a car at night with no headlights; then apply that to a scalpel in an ear canal)

Now, what exactly is a TECA?

A TECA (Total Ear Canal Ablation) is a surgical procedure that removes the ear canal and middle ear of a dog or cat to treat irreversible ear disease. This is typically recommended for cats or dogs with chronic ear infections and Cancerous growths in the ear canal.

Veterinarians will try everything possible before even considering this procedure... Which tells you how serious Walter's case had to be for them to make this decision.

I've always prided myself on being able to take care of things by myself, but this is one I'm going to need a little help with, so I'm asking others to please help me save my baby, I can't imagine life without him.

We did the responsible thing when we got Walter and immediately signed him up for pet insurance, though because this is a pre-existing condition (from his abusers), his pet insurance refuses to cover any condition that started before he was signed up.

We've tried explaining that Walter is a rescue kitty and that we couldn't help this circumstance, but the contract is airtight. Due to this, we have been paying out-of-pocket for every vet visit, medication, vaccine, etc. Though we can manage to figure out how to pay a $100-300 bill on our own, this one's a bit more difficult.

I understand that times are hard, that's why I'm here and asking. If you could please share this if you can't afford to donate, it'd mean everything to my little family. Thank you for reading this all the way through, and please have a good day ♡