Wednesday, April 28, 2010

On the up swing!

This is day 12 if you count the stem cell transfusion to be day 0. We saw a HUGE change today in the way Carla felt and her blood counts. Last night she was able to eat real food for the first time since day 2. She has been wearing a 24 hour infusor each day to help her with nausea. I think it has helped.


Since I posted last she has had to have the nausea infusor each day, one bag of platelets and an infusor for potassium and magnesium. Since she was having nausea even taking her large number of pills, they started giving her medications as IV's. This have meant that we have to stay at 7C blood lab about an extra hour or more but we know she gets her meds. We were afraid that if she threw up soon after taking her pills, then she would not be getting her meds.

Today her white cell count jumped from 0.8 to above 3! Her platelets also came up from about 30 to 54! The nurses said they wished Carla could help the other patients with their platelets.

As yet, the growth factor shots have not caused excessive bone pain. This bone pain in her back was a huge problem in transplant #1 and she didn't have much nausea. This time those side effects were just reversed.

I think today was her last time to get the meds as an IV. I think she can take her pills tomorrow. Tomorrow should be the last day for her growth factor shot.

We have a scheduled appointment with Dr. Barlogie on Monday, May 3. I anticipate that he will discharge Carla and we can go home. We both want this break to be longer than the last breaks as we feel we both need some recovery time. This means I will have to pack up all of our stuff as we will release our apartment so we don't have to pay rent over a longer break.

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Same ol', Same ol'. Not!

We thought the second stem cell transplant would be similar to the first.  Boy were we wrong!  Carla got the high dose melphalan on Thursday and received two bags of her stem cells on Friday.  She felt good on Saturday and we did some shopping at Walmart.  Sunday she felt OK until the evening.  She was very nauseated and didn't feel like eating much.  I didn't think much about it until when she got up Monday and said it was one of her roughest nights.  She had medicine for nausea so she took that and went to the blood lab.

She is basically still nauseated and not hungry.  She has forced some chicken broth and Jello down today.  They gave her some nausea medicine both yesterday and today.  Her blood pressure has been lower every day and they have given her a liter of saline solution.  Today  they gave her 2 liters.  They also attached an infusor to her catheter that runs for 24 hours.

She isn't running any fever and her white cell count and platelets are dropping just like transplant one.  Her electrolytes have been great and everything is going great except for the nausea and lack of appetite.

The APN said she thinks patient's bodies don't get back to normal and they get hit with the second high dose chemo and stem cell transplant.  It might be similar to being knocked down and then when you try to get up you get knocked down again. 

Regardless, we both are glad there isn't a third stem cell transplant scheduled!

Monday, April 12, 2010

Back in Little Rock

Wow!  The four-week break flew by and we are back in Little Rock for Carla's second stem cell transplant.  The drive down was beautiful.  The red bud and dogwood trees put on quite a display for us.  I didn't stop to take pictures but I will post some pictures from our yard in Springfield.

Carla started today off with a 7:00 a.m. MRI that took 2 1/2 hours.  This was followed by a full body bone density test, and a blood and urine test.  We also met with the data manager concerning the research protocol. 

Tomorrow Carla is schedule for to for that dreaded bone marrow procedure at 7:45 a.m.  This is where they go in through the pelvis in the lower back and extract a sample of bone marrow.  A gene and chromosome analysis is performed on this bone marrow sample.  At 11:00, Carla's breathing is checked.  At 12:00 we are scheduled to meet with a research nurse.  At 12:45 her heart is checked.  We get a break to come back to the apartment before getting a 90 minute PET scan performed at 6:00 p.m.

The PET scan requires a six hour fast before it and Carla can't eat many carbs after tonight.  This has trigger severe migraines for Carla is the past.  Hopefully we can prepare by taking meds prior to this procedure.  It is also difficult for Carla to lie on her back for this 90 and 120 minute procedures.

The doctor should have the results of these two-days of test when we meet with him on Wednesday.  If she is deemed ready for the stem cell transplant, she will get the tri-Lumen catheter implanted on Wednesday afternoon, get the high dose of melphalan on Thursday followed by her stem cells on Friday.

Here are some pictures of our backyard.