Pat The Dog, Heal his Heart
“I don’t have good news.” Words you never want to hear from your vet.
We took Patrick in for what seemed to be a simple little cough. However, x-rays revealed a sizeable mass on his heart. Large enough that Pat’s trachea was being pushed to the side, causing the cough. Looking at the x-ray of our sweet boy, our hearts sank.
Patrick has been THE central member of our family for over two and a half years. We are lulled to sleep by his snoring, enchanted by his amazing personality, and we live for his snuggles.
He came to us as a rescue when he was approximately 5 years old. We really wanted a dog whom we could help. We've worked with him and his amazing vets to get his skin allergies and ear infections under control, and watched him grow into the life and health he deserved. In addition to typical bulldog issues, he’s dealt with seizures, a mast cell tumor and a 3rd degree AV block requiring a pacemaker. It hasn't always been easy. But now we are facing the biggest challenge yet.
The tumor Pat has been diagnosed with is a slow-growing chemodectoma tumor on his heart. It's inoperable, but we hope to use chemotherapy to stop it's growth or even shrink the tumor. We were not interested in putting him through chemo until we learned that this form of chemo is a pill administered at home 3 times a week, and it has very few side effects. He won't even lose his hair!
It's a new drug, and as you can imagine it's quite expensive! It will cost more than $3000 in just the first 6 weeks to figure out if the treatment will be effective. If the six-week trial is effective, he will need continued medication and monitoring for the rest of his life at the cost of approximately $600 per month.
This cost is way more than we could have anticipated, and will be a huge burden on our family, but we don’t want to give up on Pat because its expensive. We are turning to you, our friends and family, to raise the money for the six week trial to see if the treatment will work. Every penny will go to Patrick's care. Anything over our goal of $3000 will go toward his long-term care or be donated to Bulldog Haven NW, the organization that originally rescued him, to make sure more dogs like Pat can find homes and lives they deserve.
Your donations, love, prayers, and kindness mean the world to us. Thank you so much for taking the time to read his story and for your support!!
Sincerely,
Patrick's humans: Jessie and Kelly
PS: we will update this page frequently and you can follow Pat on [email redacted]dog
