Update November 2020.
AAHA took legal action to force us to take their declawing information and screenshots from this 2016 story. Here’s our press release about it. AAHA sicced their lawyers on City the Kitty
Story published in January 2016.
Last year AAHA came out with new declawing position statement, “The American Animal Hospital Association strongly opposes the declawing of domestic cats and supports veterinarians’ efforts to educate cat owners and provide them with effective alternatives.”
YET THEY HAVE ZERO ACCOUNTABILITY FOR THEIR DECLAWING POSITION AND MANY OF THEIR AAHA HOSPITALS STILL DECLAW CATS.
WHAT IS THE POINT OF HAVING THIS POSITION STATEMENT IF THEY DON’T CARE IF THEIR HOSPITALS FOLLOW IT????
THEIR DOUBLE STANDARDS AND LACK OF ACCOUNTABILITY IS HURTING HUNDREDS AND THOUSANDS OF INNOCENT CATS!
AAHA vets continue to put out coupons for declaws, make YouTube videos promoting their laser declaws for 3 month or 3 lb kittens, advertise declaws on their facebook pages to help save furniture, talk cat owners OUT of the humane alternatives, and deceive cat owners to believe that declawing is ok to do to their cats.
We’ve even found an AAHA hospital that requires cat owners to get the $35 pain meds for their 4 paw declaws but NOT for their 2 paw declaws.
Teeger , Abby, and Ryder were declawed at an AAHA Hospital. They have had most of their paws amputated due to horrific complications from their declaw procedures. The AAHA hospital owner veterinarian and AVMA vet that declawed him and his siblings, talked the first time cat owners OUT of using SOFTPaws and said that declawing is a, “standard and common procedure” and that their cats would be fine.
The American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) mandates that their hospitals can’t perform nonanesthetic dental cleanings, yet they won’t do the same about declawing even though they are opposed to declawing.
AAHA says that non-anesthesia dental cleanings are stressful to pets and can be potentially dangerous.
Declawing is very dangerous, stressful, disabling, unnecessary, and an inhumane procedure that ALSO should NOT be performed at their practices.
Nonanesthetic dental cleanings are NOT a lucrative veterinary procedure but anesthesia dental cleanings are very common and veterinarian$ can make a lot of money from them.
Declawing is a lucrative procedure for many veterinarian$ including for many vets at AAHA hospitals.
The vet at this AAHA hospital made $40.75 for each toe bone and claw that was amputated in this declaw procedure.
MANDATORY DENTAL STANDARD PRESS RELEASE FROM AAHA- AAHA mandatory dental standard
AAHA PRESS RELEASE ABOUT THE REVISED DECLAW POSITION STATEMENT- AAHA declawing press release
Most AAHA hospitals declaw cats and most do NOT follow the AAHA declawing position.
Below are many of these examples that you are sending us of AAHA hospitals that are not following AAHA position statement standards when it comes to declawing.
Here’s another AAHA hospital with a 37 yr member AVMA vet whose practice told one of our researchers that their way of laser declawing is inhumane. They charge around $800-$1000 but want you to know that it is different than how the other vets do it who just cut them out. They say there are no negatives consequences to declawing if it’s done properly. They want you to know that there are a lot of clinics that don’t do laser declawing and Dr Anderson “does declaws all the time” and has been “practicing for over 30 years.” They say your cats are, “back to normal about a week later.” When you ask about the horror stories about how bad declawing is they say, “those are people that are not having it properly done or most of the time it’s not laser declawing it’s the original declawing.”
Here is a VCA , AAHA, Cat Friendly AAFP hospital with a 16 yr member AVMA veterinarian who is advertising her declaws to protect furniture.
UPDATE Jan. 2020- (VCA stopped declawing in all their animal hospitals in Jan. 2020.)
Here is their laser declaw promotional video Heartland Animal Hospital PC, Bartlett, Illinois Declaw video [button href=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M18mw6d00Yo” color=”red” newwindow=”yes”] Declaw Promotional Video of 3 month old kittens on all four paws at this AAHA hospital[/button]
These screenshots are from Newton Veterinary Hospital, an AAHA hospital in NJ/NY, with long standing AVMA member veterinarians, want to deceive cat owners to believe that amputating a kitten’s toe bones and claws is going to improve it’s quality of life and this mutilating procedure is important for the kitten’s preventative care. This AAHA practice mission statement says it is to provide the highest standard of veterinary care for the long-term health of your pet and they say their preventive care plan enables them to do so.
Just to check, I had my Feline research team call them, and they also 4 paw declaw your cat. No questions asked or counseling on the humane alternatives.
When asked if declawing is bad, they say declawing with their laser, “promotes faster healing” and “after a couple weeks of healing they will be perfectly fine.”
Screenshot from NewtonVet.com
Screenshot from NewtonVet.com
Here is another AAHA practice in the Midwest.
“Would you like the front paws or all four paws?”, the person on the phone asked when inquiring about prices for getting a cat declawed at this AAHA practice.
This hospital has the largest professional staff in the Midwest, with 17 veterinarians, most are AVMA members and some AAFP members. They have been serving this community for 50 yrs. Their motto is that they are “Caring for your best friend.”
When you call them to inquire about a declaw price, they ask you if you want the front paw$ or all four paw$. No efforts to educate the client on the effective humane alternatives on the website or on the phone. They say you can bring your kitty in anytime and they will require a $60 exam to see if the cat is “healthy enough to have this surgery” and for $359.50 you can have your kitty declawed on all four paws.
Screenshot from their website- Dundee Animal Hospital
Here is another one in Indianapolis-
When you call this AAHA/AAFP/Cat Friendly practice to see how much it would cost to have a 5 yr old cat declawed on all four paws, the receptionist didn’t ask if the humane alternatives have been tried and simply gave the price of $480 plus a $70 exam for the 4 paw declaw. When you ask if there are any problems with doing this and the person said, “every cat is different and some may have paws that are more sensitive but that they always heal up with no problems.”
Here’s the note we received from a concerned person about this clinic…
“I was in the process of finding a vet in the Indianapolis area because I recently moved here. During the course of my search, I was disgusted to find an AAHA/AAFP, “Cat Friendly” feline-only vet clinic in Indianapolis who is not only pro-declaw, but advertises a discount on their website for performing the procedure in combination with spay/neuter, and also barely even touches on alternatives to declawing.
I realize this is somewhat common in mixed-animal practices, but this is the first time I’ve ever seen it in a feline-only practice. This AAHA practice also makes it a point to say they are one of just 12% of hospitals that are AAHA-accredited, but their policies are in direct contradiction to the AAHA and AAFP stance on declawing.
Is there anything I can/should do? I’m normally not the type of person to set out to complain or anything like that. I’m worried people who are not educated on declawing will take their cats there and assume the vet is trustworthy and knows so much about cats due to having a feline-only practice, and will declaw their cats, all the while not knowing any better. Its just really bothering me.
Luckily, I found Dr. Nicole Moran at the CAt Care Clinic, through the Paw Project fb page, and will be taking my two cats to her”
Here is the description on this website on how this 30 yr member vet of the AVMA, AAHA hospital, and AAFP vet does her declaws-
Here is a note we received about this AAHA practice in the NorthWest-
”I worked at _________ , an AAHA accredited practice for many years, an accreditation my former boss takes much pride in. But he won’t stop declawing as it brings in a lot of money. If “NO declawing” was part of this process, he’d have to stop to keep the AAHA accreditation and keeping it is a VERY big deal to him. My former boss prides himself on being “cutting edge” and on the front lines of the “best”. At this practice, they made lots of talk about how the laser was “better” than the other “old” methods. He doesn’t declaw his client’s cats on all four paws but he declawed his own cats in on all four paws.”
Screenshot from the website of this AAHA practice.
No words are necessary for this Cats only AAHA practice. AAHA, AVMA, and AAFP all say declawing is amputations but this practice wants to deceive their cat clients to believe that declawing is just removing the toenails. And they advise clients to do a tendonectomy on their older and heavier cats and that it is “less traumatic.”
Here is another AAHA practice that had a coupon for 2 or 4 paw declaws-
Just to make check, our researcher called them to get a cost for a 3 yr old cat declaw and the receptionist asked, “Do you want to do all four or just the front two?”
They asked if there are any negative consequences and asked about how they perform the declaws.
The receptionist said, “ Basically with a laser they heal up quicker and it’s less painful and within a week they will be healed.” And it will be $475. 55 for all four paw$.
So the next day, our exec. director tried to go about this in a private way to just have an educational dialogue, and wanted to see if this practice knew about AAHA’s revised policy on declawing and that it was a stronger stance against it.
The manager said that they were just recently re-certified and that, “AAHA and AAFP went over their website, researched protocols, and toured their practice.” This manager told our exec. director in a condescending way, “ You’re not in a place to say if we counsel clients with the humane alternatives and I’m going to end this conversation now.”
And she hung up on her.
Here is a popular South Carolina Animal Hospital’s “About” page that has 3 clinics. All three of them declaw kitties and are AAFP “Cat Friendly” practices, and two of them are AAHA accredited and this one even was top 3 finalist for the AAHA practice of the year award. [button href=”http://www.clevelandparkgreenville.com/staff/” color=”red” newwindow=”yes”] Cleveland Clinic[/button]
Upon further research, my FBI team (Feline Bureau of Investigation) made a few phone calls to this hospital asked about a cat declaw cost. This specific clinic asked if you want 2 paw or 4 paws.
When you ask them if a 4 paw declaw was bad for a cat, the response was, “As with any declaw the cat is required to stay overnight.”
The price for their non-laser, 4 paw declaw was $430 to $650 depending on the vet that you pick, since they all use different anesthesia and pain meds one person was told.
When asked is the cat going to be hurt or harmed from this procedure., the answer was, “We are excellent at declaws. We probably do more declaws more frequently and more volume than any other clinic.” In all of the phone calls, there was no mention of coming in for counseling on the alternatives to this mutilating procedure.
This is also the practice where Dr Andy Roark works and even though Dr Roark says he is against declawing, 5 different staff members at this hospital told a cat owner on the phone that they could make an appointment with him to declaw their cat. Dr Roark told my our exec. director in an email that they must have made a mistake since he has stopped declawing and is against it.
Here’s another AAHA hospital
And here you have one of the many sad consequences of AAHA’s lack of accountability in their “standards” in their hospitals. This would never have happened if they put the same mandatory requirement like they do non-anesthesia dental cleanings.
These first time cat owners sought out a highly rated veterinary hospital in California because they wanted the best care for their cats. They chose this AAHA hospital.
The veterinarian who owns this AAHA hospital and this AVMA/AAFP vet, who did these declaws talked the first time cat owners OUT of using soft paws and told them declawing is a “standard and common” procedure and their cats would be fine. Eight months later, all of these cats have lost most or all of their paws from complications and are going through a living nightmare of pain and suffering.
Here is the AAHA revised position statement on declawing from their website- AAHA declawing position statement