Thursday, June 4, 2009

Transplant B, Day +8: Turning the corner

Another uneventful day in the lab. WBC crept up from 0.03 to 0.17, which hopefully means that I have two more days of Neutropenia at most. Immature reticulocytes quadrupled today and are now squarely in the normal range -- that probably means my whites will be in the normal range in four days. Hemoglobin at 10.8, basically the same from yesterday. Platelets were 14, so I got another infusion. CRP is at 40, but all my bloodwork is negative for viruses and bacteria, so the APN and I both believe it's from the Neupogen shots and the ensuing hematpoesis (blood manufacturing). All my electrolytes were in good shape.

On the basis of this, I have a discharge appointment scheduled for next Tuesday, which is two days earlier than I thought and at 12 days after transplant, pretty darn good! I'll have cancer markers from the blood draw today back on Saturday or Sunday, and that's probably the most up-to-date data we'll have for Tuesday -- we MIGHT get data from the Monday draw but I doubt it. I hope the M-spike is continuing to fall...I don't expect it to be zero before I leave, unfortunately, but if it is 0.2 or even better 0.1, I'll be happy because I'm sure it will continue to fall.

They'll do another bone marrow, of course, when I return here before consolidation. I'm guessing that will be done in the first week of July. And that will be the time to see if the immunofixation test is negative. So I've got a month to get rid of the last of these damn cells.

Anyhow, a great day in general, and I'm almost through this third of the fourth treatments. To celebrate, I issued a double-dog-dare to my digestive tract and got some Chicken Vindaloo. Yum!!!!

Go Lakers!