Sunday, September 16, 2012

How Much Does It Cost To Take A Guinea Pig To The Vet?

In the past, we've talked a little bit about how much it costs when you need to take your guinea pig to the vet. Regarding Broccoli's neutering, we said: "The total cost of the process was the vet visit ($77) plus the neutering ($320) plus the Oxbow Critical Care ($14). The vet threw in the cost for the Meloxicam pain killer for free (would have been $20)." We also mentioned that the humans had to pay $65 for a phone consultation with the ASPCA after Lola ate a lily that she shouldn't have eaten.

We wanted to list some of the other things the vet has charged our humans for so you know how much it costs to take care of a guinea pig. Note that these prices are what we've paid over the course of about 4 years for 4 different guinea pigs. On average, healthy pigs only need an EXAM and a couple of NAIL TRIMS every year.

Basic Exam:
* Exam/Consultations - $77

Exam costs for treating Broccoli, the feral guinea pig
* Fecal Float (that is, checking for parasites in our poop) - $24
* Neutering (only needed so that he could live with us girls) - $320
* Oxbow Critical Care (needed to offset the loss of appetite due to the painkiller) - $14

Grooming:
* Sanitary Clip (in other words, a haircut. Only Buffy needs this because she is a long-haired texel) - $18
* Nail trim - $18
* Wound treatment, small - $36 (this ended up being free because the vet accidentally clipped Lola's nail too short)
* Meloxicam 5mg/ml inject - $30.70 (this was also free to treat Lola's too-short nail)
* Meloxicam 1.5mg/ml - $18 (again, free and used to prevent infection and pain to Lola's nail)

Charges for end-of-life care:
* Hospitalize Initial Day - $35
* Fluids SQ Medium - $25
* Digital Radiography: 2 views SM - $185 (for diagnosis of a massive bladder stone)
* Euthanasia Medium - $42 (poor Annie... we miss you!)

So, as you can see, our vet bills aren't cheap. Before you bring a guinea pig home, make sure you can afford to care for us.
I'm totally worth it!

2 comments:

  1. Thank you for posting this!
    I have two girls, but it's good to have all the costs roughly (I'm in Canada) laid out for me for almost everythign!

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  2. Thank you for doing this...its good (essential) for people to understand the costs before adopting a piggie

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