K9 Enrichment Initiative: Senior Pet Adoption Assistance Grant Report

How did this grant help your organization and the pets in your care?

The Senior Pet Adoption Assistance grant enabled us to purchase medication and supplements needed for our senior German shepherd Von Ruger as part of a sponsorship for adoption.

How many pets did this grant help?

1

Please provide a story of one or more specific pets this grant helped.

Von Ruger has endocrine pancreatic insufficiency, which is a lifetime chronic illness.

Von Ruger’s body can not digest food without it first being treated with pancreatic enzymes. He also battles vitamin B12 deficiency and must take a daily supplement tablet. Von Ruger is not able to have treats or eat outside his daily meals.

Von Ruger was with us for 10 months after we took guardianship from his owners, where his weight had dropped to 52 lbs. His body was starving to death.

Our being able to provide his adoptive family with two years’ worth of enzymes and supplements lessens the burden should he need medical care. His adoption came after we posted that he would have sponsorship for his medications.

Adopting a senior dog can be scary and filled with health unknowns; adopting one with a chronic illness with expensive treatment is daunting. We are grateful to have been able to set his family up with the medications at a time when price increases on the product continue to rise, ensuring that he has a long-term supply.

We are grateful to the Petfinder Foundation for giving Von Ruger a strong start in his new life and peace of mind to us and his family that his medication is secured for the foreseeable future.

The first photo shows Von Ruger being bathed upon arrival; the others show him today. The last photo is Von Ruger with his new dad.