Sunday, January 31, 2010

MDS Becomes AML - Progress continues!

Daily Mitch Report – Sunday, January 31, 2010


The good news continues. The white blood count is 3.1, and while that rates an” L for low” on the printout, for Mitch it is very positive. Platelets are at 21,000, and hemoglobin 9.4. Even Dr. Sharma was very pleasantly surprised and has taken him off the Neupogen to see how he does on his own. She’ll do a bone marrow biopsy middle of next week to see what the cells look like. And the infectious disease guys say they’ll take him off all the antibiotics when the white count is better.

An X-ray of the abdomen this afternoon shows no blockage, so he has been given official permission to eat clear fluids. He’ll stay on the TPN until we see how well his digestive system handles food, and then that will taper off. Keep your fingers crossed. And we’ll try to remember this improvement once he starts complaining about the food again.

He’s still very tired. The activity for the day was sitting in a chair while I cut his fingernails and trimmed his beard. Then he washed his hair with a shampoo cap – that’s a shower cap with a moist lining that one rubs around the head. It’s a good thing he doesn’t have much hair. We’ll know we’ve really arrived when he finally gets to take a shower.

So stay tuned and we hope to announce more progress tomorrow at the beginning of a new month.

Penny, Mitch and Laina

2 comments:

  1. Good news indeed! I'll be thinking of you when I make my regular 2.5-month appointment to give blood. It's not possible to target my donation but I figure that every pint I give here frees up another pint for our boy.

    btw, the friendly vampires at the NY Blood Center told me that what they really want is not whole blood but platelets -- and that platelets can be donated every three days. Plasma can be artifically concocted but, unfortunately, not platelets. Knowing how much they're needed, it's worth giving as often as possible.

    Here's dripping for you, Mitch!

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  2. Mitch: I promised a perfect run for you in Courmayer; unfortuately I was less than perfect, but it was pretty darn OK. I'm just recovering from the excess wine we drank every night toasting to YOU.

    Keep fighting ; it;s worth the effort.

    Dave B.

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