Stem Cell Extraction: Day 9

Karl had a lot of pain overnight and slept little if at all. We had to be at the hospital for 1030. Sherry and Stacey were the nurses. Stacey called Dr. Hickey, the transplant doctor who was scheduled to see Karl today, and got permission to give him a shot of morphine. While he still complained of intense pain, his body language indicated that it did take the edge off.

Sherry drew blood from his lines, flushed them out, and gave Karl the Neupogen shots and then we waited for the blood work to come back. The results didn’t all come at once, but as they appeared on their computer Sherry or Stacey relayed them to us. In the first batch was the platelet number. If it dropped below 50 it would mean a transfusion. It was 163, so no worries there. The next results included hemoglobin and neutrophils. The hemoglobin was in the 130s, which is fine. The neutrophils were where expected, but it is not fine. For a healthy person the neutrophils (which is part of the white blood cells) are 2 or higher. When you take chemo, this number goes down. If it drops below 1 the patient can’t have chemo. During the 7 months of chemo Karl’s neutrophil number was usually between 1.3 and 1.8, although one week he had an amazing 3.8, and one week it was 1.1. Today it was 0.1. That’s the number that most people have after the high dose Cyclophosphamide, so while this number is worrisome, it wasn’t an unexpected number. Now we have to be extra cautious of fever and infection because he has absolutely no reserve in his immune system to fight.

The last result from the blood work that we waited and waited to get was a result indicating kidney function. That result was also fine. Then Dr. Hickey came to Ambulatory Care to see Karl. After examination she ordered another half dose morphine shot, and gave him a prescription for more morphine to take at home.

After dropping off the prescription we went through a McDonald’s drive through to pick up lunch, and got home around 2. After eating only a little, Karl went to bed. He slept most of the afternoon. He’s up now, but so is his temperature. It’s not terribly high - just 37.6, but we have to keep monitoring because if it goes to 38 we go to emerge. No road is without curves on this journey.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

First visit with the transplant team! Well the best news is that after 187 days on chemo Dr. Jones told Karl to stop taking it as of today. And he gets at least 2 weeks chemo free. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Karl's appointment was for 1pm, so we left Eastport at 9am. For those of you not familiar with the geography of the island of Newfoundland, it takes 3 hours to drive from Eastport to the capital city of St. John's, and we only have two seasons, winter and construction, so you have to give yourself extra time. Our understanding was that we had an appointment, so we assumed that we'd be out of the hospital by 2ish. We were wrong. We were led into an exam room right on time at 1, so at that point all looked    great from our point of view. Then we waited. And waited some more. It was the theme of the afternoon. Nurse practitioner Charlene came in at 1:25. Her first information was that we would be meeting with several people, so the appointment would be a w
Read more

The bone marrow is two years old!

Image
I feel like we should be having cake, but Karl’s research tells him that sugar feeds cancer cells, so we (him more than me) have cut back on sugar. He also tries to avoid artificial sweeteners except in Diet Pepsi, which he just can’t completely give up. Quality of life is important too. So it hasn’t been all smooth sailing. Karl takes daily chemo in an oral pill form, and like all chemo there are side effects. He is learning to manage the side effects better, in some cases through other medications, but you do what you have to do. During the summer his neutrophils (the white blood cells that fight infections) were dangerously low. We spent most of that time at home so as to avoid other people who may have been sick. Even catching a normal cold is a big deal for Karl. He had one earlier in the fall and had to go to his doctor where he was prescribed an antibiotic and a puffer, and had to go back for a checkup after a week to make sure his lungs had started to clear. To put it in pers
Read more

Post Transplant Day 3

Boring is still the flavour of the day! It has been a slow weekend here on 4 North A. Karl’s blood counts have continued to drop, but with the exception of his hemoglobin which was low to start, everything else is still within normal range, albeit at the lower end of normal. I expect either tomorrow or Tuesday will bring below normal counts. Karl is tired, which is to be expected given the low hemoglobin, the chemo, and the end of the steroids which boosts his energy. He always had a severe drop in energy as the dex wore off, and we are seeing the same pattern now. Otherwise, he is not having any real side effects yet. We know that won’t last, but take it while you can right? Karl hopes the hospital  is bringing in take out wings for supper. I know it’s good to think positive, but I have a feeling it’s not going to help with this wish!
Read more