When Your Dog Has Epilepsy: Financial Relief for Pet Prescriptions
Key takeaways:
Rachelle Hinton is a dog mom of a Japanese mastiff named Benji, whom she rescued when he was 8 months old.
Just before he turned 2, Benji started having seizures and was diagnosed with idiopathic epilepsy.
Rachelle turned to GoodRx for coupons for Benji’s prescriptions to ease some of the financial burden.
GoodRx for Pets: Here’s how to save on pet medications with GoodRx.
The COVID-19 pandemic made Rachelle Hinton a dog owner.
In 2020, Rachelle’s teenage son was quarantined at his father’s house a few blocks away. Rachelle says she was alone and in need of some companionship. So she rescued Benji, an 8-month-old Japanese mastiff.
“The whole world was shut down, and I had already been looking on rescue sites for mastiffs,” Rachelle says. She saw Benji’s profile on her Las Vegas neighborhood’s Nextdoor page and thought, “Ah, he’s mine,” she says.
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Being a dog mom was going just fine until 2 weeks before Benji’s second birthday. That’s when his health took a turn, and he had his first grand mal seizure. For about 30 or 40 seconds, a terrified Rachelle watched Benji having involuntary muscle spasms.
“I thought he was dying,” she says. “It was the scariest thing I've ever experienced.”
The sticker shock of a vet bill and pet epilepsy meds
Rachelle called her vet and explained what had happened. The vet said if Benji had another seizure within the next 24 hours, she should bring him in to be evaluated. Two hours later, he had another one.
Rachelle took Benji to the vet, and he was diagnosed with idiopathic epilepsy. It’s a condition that has no identifiable cause but can lead to recurring seizures.
The vet sent them home with a prescription for phenobarbital, a sedative used to manage seizures. Veterinarians use phenobarbital as an off-label medication since it is not FDA approved to treat dogs. The medication helps control seizures by regulating brain activity. This reduces the frequency and intensity of seizures.
When she filled the prescription, Rachelle recalls, she was a little shocked at the price of the medication.
Rachelle Hinton turned to the GoodRx app to find prescription savings for her dog’s medications.
“At the time, during COVID, we had our pay cut by 40%,” she says. “I wasn't struggling financially, but things were tight.”
Once Benji started taking the medication, he was seizure-free for about a month and a half. After another seizure, Rachelle took Benji back to the vet. He was prescribed an additional medication: levetiracetam (Keppra), another seizure medication.
Around this time, Rachelle says, she found a canine seizure support group on Facebook. The people in the group understood her situation. And in addition to offering her support, they suggested using the GoodRx app for pet medication discounts.
“I was, like, ‘How are you guys affording all of this medication?’” she recalls asking. “It was a resounding chorus of ‘GoodRx.’”
By this time, Rachelle was spending hundreds of dollars a month on medications. After she looked into prescription savings with GoodRx, she ended up saving thousands of dollars.
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“Now, he’s on 21 pills a day,” Rachelle says in a TikTok video she created for GoodRx. She adds that the prescriptions are worth it because the medication has been life-saving for Benji. “I just picked up his prescription last week,” she says in the video. “And on the receipt, it says, ‘You saved $1,100.’”
Helping her dog live his best life
Epilepsy is a condition Benji will likely have for the rest of his life. He takes three medications a day to prevent seizures. And he has two other medications that Rachelle can give him in the event of a seizure.
At times, Benji goes several months without experiencing a seizure. Every morning, Rachelle gives him a treat with his pill. And she tells him they can celebrate having another day together.
By sharing Benji’s story, Rachelle says, she hopes people will be more informed about the possibility of their dog developing epilepsy. She also wants people to know that if you parent a dog with a chronic condition, it’s not the end of the world.
“It’s scary, and it’s stressful,” she says. “It doesn’t take over your life, but you are going to have to make some adjustments.”
One change Rachelle has made is setting up a camera that she uses to monitor and check in on Benji while she’s working. She has also blocked off the stairs at home, so that Benji won’t fall down them if he has a seizure when he’s unattended.
Rachelle says that several people have asked her why she doesn’t just get rid of the dog. She says that’s not an option for her. She tells people: “I’m going to make sure that, while he’s here, he has a good life.”
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