Buddy the Bearded Dragon Needs His Arm Amputated

Hi everyone, my name is Kristen. It is taking me a lot to come forward to ask for help as this is the first time I have ever had to to ask for help with any of our animals. Always knew that there would be a lot of costs associated with cats and dogs, but never thought reptiles would suddenly cost us a small fortune (at least in our eyes it is small fortune). Well unfortunately it seems that something happened to our Bearded Dragon named Buddy. He got an infection in his right arm and his bones are literally disintegrating! As you can see from the picture, there should be two bones attaching the "elbow to the wrist" but his right arm only has 1 bone showing and it is detached completely. Seems that he had hurt his arm a few months back and just this past month his arm started to swell/balloon up. We were able to make an appointment with our regular vet and after some xrays, you will see..... his body is literally absorbing his bones. We aren't sure if it is cancer or an infection. But we know that we need to have his entire arm amputated to avoid anything from spreading to the rest of his body.

We made the trek to Tufts Veterinary Clinic in North Grafton MA on 1/23/24 as they specialize in this type of amputation. But they were pretty surprised as well to see how much bone was gone. Before they continue with the amputation, they needed to take xrays/catscan to make sure there wasn't anything showing in the rest of his body. Fortunately the xrays came back clean! They did basic blood panel as well as a full blood chemistry to make sure there isn't any infection throughout his blood. This would be terrible if they were to amputate and become septic etc.

Buddy is still healthy/happy.....eating, drinking, going to the bathroom regularly. He is a happy Beardie. But the longer we keep his arm attached, the bigger of a risk that this will be for him.

The cost of saving our Buddy's life by performing this amputation, is much more money than we ever expected. But if you know us, we would do anything it takes to make sure our animals are healthy and happy. The cost of the regular vet visit was $401.47 and the high estimate at Tufts is $3,584.50 for a total of: $3985.97. I'm sure after this amputation is performed, there will be pain management as well as other meds to give him afterwards. This we can handle. Again, we hate to ask for any help, but anything towards the total costs of these 2 bills would be the greatest help.

From the bottom of our hearts, we thank you all for anything you can do to help.

-Kristen