Circle of Friends Animal Shelter: Grant Report

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

Joint supplement medication, x-rays, adoption-fee subsidy, joint-health food, collar, leash and bed.

Thanks to the Purina One Senior Pet Adoption Assistant Grant, we were able to find Sweet Potato a loving home. We were able to remove barriers for potential adopters by providing medications, special food, supplies and a subsidized adoption fee.

How many pets did this grant help?

1

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

Sweet Potato is a 12-year-old yellow Lab who came to Circle of Friends Animal Shelter as a stray. He was found roaming on the county roads and was brought to us by a concerned citizen. At his entry exam, Sweet Potato was in rough shape. His nails were extremely overgrown, he had large calluses on his elbows, and he was limping and in desperate need of a bath. Most concerning, he had difficulties even standing on his own. When he found the strength to stand, he could only support himself for a short while before needing one of our laps to flop onto.

We immediately contacted our veterinarian and got him started on Dasuquin to help support his joint health and Vetprofen to help manage any pain he may be in. After being on his medication for a bit, he is almost like a brand new dog! He is now able to move around much better, though he still knocks himself over while trying to play like a puppy.

After he’d been in the shelter for a few days, we noticed that his right hock had started to swell. Our veterinarian recommended x-rays. Once we got him in for an x-ray, we received the sad prognosis from the veterinarian that Sweet Potato had bone cancer and only a few weeks to a few months left to live. The swelling was a pathological fracture that our veterinarian suspects was caused by the cancer. This prognosis would make it difficult for us find him his last loving home before he passed, but we believed and had hope that there is someone out there who will take this amazing Sweet Potato into their heart and home for his final days.

Sweet Potato was adopted on Nov. 29, 2019, after having multiple visits. The family who adopted Sweet Potato originally was looking for a new family pet as theirs had recently passed away of cancer. Once they saw Sweet Potato on our Facebook page, they fell instantly in love. The family now calls him Sweetie and is happy to have him for as long as they can.