Today I went to the hospital to get my first dose of mature lymphocytes from my brother Harry. But I also got some disturbing news about my blood counts ...
It snowed a couple of days ago, but the roads to London were all cleared nicely, and I arrived just after 09:30. Harry was already hooked up to the apheresis machine, but the vein they were taking the blood from kept spasming and stopping its blood supply. Eventually things settled down after they put a warm blanket round his arm, and the cells were collected. They did not take much - only about 100ml - but each dose is also quite small. After Harry was unhooked we went for lunch (fish and chips, very good as usual), and then came back for a quick check of Harry's blood which was all OK. The harvested cells went off to the lab, I went to the pharmacy and Harry went home. Let me thank Harry very much for his ongoing donations - I would not be here without them.
The cells came back from the lab OK, so they put in a cannula and took blood (it is a month since my last blood count). My haemoglobin is fine at 11.6, platelets OK at 178 and lymphocytes continuing to increase at 0.89; but my neutrophils have dropped to 0.72 (less than 0.5 is neutropenia). It was a bit like a slap in the face! It happened back in November, and they recovered OK, but it is still worrying. They gave me a shot of GCSF (stem cell growth hormone) and I am going back to the hospital on Friday to have another blood count. Fingers crossed eh!
The dose of lymphocytes they gave me was 4ml - so not very much! It was given with 500ml of saline, so it took over 30 minutes, but was uneventful. They start to work in 4 weeks ...
Last week we went to our house in France for the first time in 18 months. Although it was cold, we have a wood fire that really heats the house well, and it was very pleasant being there and making plans for the year. I am looking forward to going back in the near future.
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