Help! Cat's acting odd/ Pet Insurance ?

Tally879

Hello, I have a 6 year old cat, usually a very happy cat that likes to follow me around.  She has a lot of energy and is usually running all over the place.  In the last week, she's become very lethargic and has been hiding.  She's been eating fine and will let you pet her and hold her so I don't she's gotten herself hurt.

Does anyone have an idea of what this may be?  I'm hoping to take her to the vet this week, but was thinking about buying health insurance for her first in case it is something major.  The insurance is about 200 a year, can someone with pet insurance give their opinion on it? Is there a waiting period for when it starts? 

spikeinc

Yes there is usually a waiting period for pet insurance. It was two weeks for mine. I found our pet insurance to be a giant waste. It only covered $1000 per year and only $500 per incident. Even though my cat had never had a history of diarrhea, the insurance company denied my claim and said that he had a history of colitis and that was why he had diarrhea and therefore they would not cover my expenses. In fact, it was intestinal cancer that caused the diarrhea which they also did not cover. Even if they had decided to cover it, the low amount they covered wouldn't have touched the $8000 we spent over the next few months in tests and biopsies. 

Anonymousey

I have a friend who's a vet tech, and when we had a scare about our cat having hyperthyroidism (just a scare, thankfully), we decided to look in to it, and I asked the friend. She basically told us it's an entire waste- they're extremely picky with what they cover- they'll happily cover an animal that's hit by a car because it's a rare occurrence, they'll cover the annuals.. but there's a lot of non-coverables. One example she gave us (because it was the most relevant at the time) was hyperthyroidism. They hate to cover things that are common occurrences.

aggiebug

I very much disagree that it is a waste of time! 

 

Yes you have to do your research and get what works for you and yes most insurance is to cover problems (so no annual checkups), but there are a LOT of options out there.  I had a patient diagnosed with cancer that was pressing on his brain, because of insurance his prognosis went from certain death to quite possibly dying of something else.  

 

edit to add: although I am not a fan of waiting to get it till you think you need it.  That is insurance fraud. AND most of the time they need a wellness anyway at the time of coverage.  Your kittys life is not worth waiting for a check up. 

Kaiene

Personally, I would get her in to the vet.  I realize that it could be something costly, but if you're concerned about her behavior, I'd try to get her in.

We do have insurance on one cat.  She has asthma, and that was diagnosed before we got the insurance, so they won't cover anything related to that.  Thankfully she is doing well (and off meds!) so I'm not terribly worried.

We have Pet Plan, and they cover many things other companies do not.  We have yet to file a claim, however.  We mainly got it because she went through a phase of eating things she wasn't supposed to and cost us $1500 at the e-vet and our vet in 6 months.

They offer a discount if you buy online and pay in full.