Archive for the ‘ Chemotherapy ’ Category

Going Home!

Yeah, surprised me too. My Absolute Neutrophil Count (ANC – a measure of the different kinds of white blood cells) spiked so sharply in the blood they took for today’s counts that I’m no longer classified as immuno-compromised and can continue my treatment as an outpatient. very exciting. The downside is that my numbers are so good [ READ MORE ]

Delay

So after all that I never had my procedures done yesterday – My numbers are right on the cusp for meeting the criterion for remission and they don’t want to have to redo painful procedures if my blood counts dip a little (which they often do) before the bone marrow results come back. In the [ READ MORE ]

Leukocytes

My usual blood draw at midnight showed my white blood cell count hit exactly 1000 – the last thing I needed to be able to move forward with my tests and treatment. For all the discussion about waiting a few extra days to let my counts recover it turns out all you had to do [ READ MORE ]

Busy Day

I’ve been waiting on a bone marrow aspirate/biopsy scheduled for day 29 of my treatment (tomorrow) which determines whether or not the chemotherapy has driven my Leukemia into remission. There are a few options for what path my treatment could take depending on this test but the scale and scope of each is determined be [ READ MORE ]

Teaching Moment

While I don’t have any other significant hospital experiences to compare it to – there are many, many pluses to being in a Harvard Medical School teaching hospital. The doctors (and staff) are numerous, attentive, talented and focused. Almost without exception those providing my care are present and working well past their appointed shifts, most [ READ MORE ]

Withdrawal

One of the stranger symptoms I experienced from Leukemia before I began treatment was night sweats. I never really understood how or why my body would choose to sweat so profusely and only when I was trying to get some sleep. After my diagnosis I found out it’s a big red flag that can indicate blood [ READ MORE ]

PCA

I had my patient controlled analgesia removed today. Mine came in the form of a constant morphine drip hooked up to the central line in my neck. Imagine a syringe the size of your forearm brimming with painkiller, the thing was a little intimidating. It would provide a constant background dose of morphine to keep [ READ MORE ]

Blood Products

For several days I’ve been lucky to be one of the uninteresting patients on the HEMONC unit, all my blood counts have been either stable or trending upwards and many of my symptoms / chemo side-effects have been clearing up. It’s been in every way a good thing but on some level it’s a little [ READ MORE ]

My old view from 765 Feldberg at BIDMC


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Links:
- XKCD
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- My Reddit Bump
- My Reddit Bump: Redux

Blogs:
- Road to Remission