Pet Paradise Odessa

This photo was taken at Pet Paradise Odessa in Odessa, FL. We have boarded our dog, Copper, with Pet Paradise for years, since we first adopted him. He is an over-all young, healthy 4-year-old dog. His most recent stay was for a week in March while we were out of the country for our anniversary. When we brought Copper home at the end of his boarding stay, we checked him over and found an infected wound under his arm. It was large, red, with pus coming out of it. I made an appointment to get him into his vet the next morning. The vet agreed it had been there multiple days to get to that point, meaning no one at Pet Paradise had noticed an infected wound on my dog with pus oozing out of it. The vet started him on antibiotics, pain medicine, and anti-inflammatories. It spread to a UTI (more medicines), and all of the medicines Copper was now on led to upset stomach and diarrhea (more medicines) for weeks. All of this snowballed over the weeks into sedated biopsies, stitches, medicine changes when the infection wasn’t clearing up, no walks, no playing, no jumping, a cone. The Vet bills have totaled over $2,000. Had his infection been caught early on, it could have been treated immediately and never gotten to this point. I am not angry that my dog got an infection at boarding. I am angry no one was taking care of my dog to notice he had an infection. Pet Paradise shared with me it is their policy to check over each dog each day after play time to catch any injuries or new scratches, etc. They also shared with me they have recently switched to a new cleaning chemical to clean out the kennels that are causing skin reactions in some of the dogs and that some managers are recommending to Corporate to stop using this chemical cleaner, but Corporate has not agreed as of now. My husband and I were informed Corporate would only refund us about $200 after all of this, 10% of our vet bills. Their reason being: we did not have Copper treated by a Pet Paradise Vet. We had been in contact with Pet Paradise for weeks through this process, and never once was it advised to bring Copper to one of their vets. Not to mention, Copper stayed at Pet Paradise Odessa – which closed their Veterinary office before Copper’s stay. We would have loved for Copper to be treated before we ever got home, but no one on site noticed anything was wrong, and there is no longer a vet onsite.  When we first signed Copper up for boarding with Pet Paradise, we signed permission for him to be treated by a vet in the event he should need treatment for anything while we are out of town. This understanding gave us peace of mind that he was well-cared-for in their boarding facility. We have cancelled Copper’s Summer stay, and could not bring ourselves to leave him there in the future, knowing their Corporate offices have no regard for the dogs in their care. Copper is doing better now, thanks to the ongoing problem solving of our wonderful vet, and no thanks to Pet Paradise.