I am going to come out and say it: nobody can make the decision to euthanize your pet except you. Deciding to say goodbye to your faithful furry friend is not something anyone takes lightly when they truly care. It is a heavy burden to bear as a pet guardian. Quite frankly, it is unfair that they live such short lives in the grand scheme of ours.
I will say it again: you struggling with this decision means that you care deeply for this animal. As a veterinarian, I can tell you wholeheartedly that despite our best efforts, there are no perfect criteria that says “now it is time” or “not yet”. Of course, there will be unfortunate situations where a pet is in a life-threatening condition and is suffering despite all of the best medicine. An example like this might be a cat in heart failure. If you’ve ever had the unfortunate experience to witness a cat in heart failure, I am so, so sorry. Cats are excellent at hiding disease – heart murmurs don’t always exist in heart disease in cats, so things like this can be sudden. Gasping for breath is incredibly distressing, and when everything under the sun has been done to help them, ending their suffering will most likely be your veterinarian’s recommendation.
What about the less obvious cases? Dogs who have had arthritis for years, or cats with kidney disease who won’t eat anymore – these are not so simple. We are human, and as such want to make sure the animals in our lives do not endure undue suffering. This is where palliative care comes in. Palliative care treats diseases symptomatically to help the patient feel better until their time comes. Treatments in this realm may involve using pain medications (even when blood work says not to), it may involve providing a pet with anti-nausea therapies, or for a cancer patient who won’t eat it may mean making them food at home (ideally with guidance form your veterinarian so as to not cause pain from rickets, or pancreatitis). For pets with dementia it may mean providing them with anti-anxiety therapies to help them feel less distressed when their mind is failing them. None of these cure any disease, but they do improve quality of life.
There are exceptions though – some pets HATE being medicated. A cat with kidney disease may despise receiving subcutaneous fluids under the skin every few days – even though the hydration helps with the nausea and helps slow the kidney disease down. A dog who refuses hidden pills in food may not at all tolerate being pilled either, even though that pill is going to help with their pain. These are cases where the kindest choice may be to say goodbye, rather than to put them through treatments that cause distress.
For pets who are in palliative treatment of a disease, there will come a point when the treatments are no longer able to provide the comfort the pet needs to enjoy life. For a dog in heart failure, this may mean they are at the highest possible doses of their medication and still coughing and having difficulty breathing. It may mean the dog with arthritis is on five different pain treatments and no longer gets out of bed to do anything they previously enjoyed. When we have run out of options to keep our pets comfortable, this is the time to say goodbye. Sometimes, the time to say goodbye is before that point, to spare them even one bad day.
Unless your pet is completely healthy, if they have a disease that cannot be appropriately managed (due to lack of treatments available, finances, individual pet nuances, safety concerns, etc.), saying goodbye is not wrong. Of course, there will be cases where diseases may arise that are completely treatable with minimal testing to find out what’s wrong. If that’s the case (as in your pet has never seen a vet, or not for the issue at hand), I would urge you to have a discussion with your veterinarian about your expectations, limitations and goals for your pet. We go to school for years and years to help fix these problems!
Quality of life scales are a tool that can be used to help you determine when it is time. They include a variety of categories to help you evaluate all aspects of your pets quality of life, some you may not have thought of. These typically provide numbers and a score at the end that can give you a more objective idea of how your pet is doing. A list of these can be found here. If after doing a quality of life scale you are still feeling confused, reach out to your family veterinarian or veterinarian with a focus on end-of-life care. They can help guide you through the process.
If you are a pet owner seeking more information about end-of-life care and live in Central Alberta (Red Deer, Calgary, and in between), please feel free to contact us for more information regarding our quality of life assessments and in-home euthanasia options.
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