Re: Cat BROKE his Hip, Please advise.
I disagree with the people who said "if it was a small child, what would you do"
If it was HER kid, that would be different. This is a stray cat she found and did the nice thing of taking him in instead of leaving him in a drain to die.. At least she took it to the vet to get it checked out anyway, she had the money to do that.. But 1,000 for a surgery for an animal that wasn't even yours? If everyone could afford that right out of nowhere like that, then maybe there wouldn't be so many homeless animals in this world.
Anyway.. not sure about supplements or anything. But I would call around to shelters and other vets and see if they could help you in anyway. Maybe even somewhere that does the surgery cheaper if you're willing to do that.
It might be able to heal on its own but he'll probably just have problems walking on it again.. Try doing some google searches for natural ways to heal broken bones..try different search terms. Whatever the vet diagnosed him with, look that up and see what comes up.