I am back at the hospital for an extra clinic appointment, and to get my Pentamadine nebulizer that I have once a month. The new building is slowly but surely getting into shape, and I was actually able to register electronically (although this is still something of a lottery, as others were unable to).
The main purpose of this appointment was to verify that my rash has not reappeared after stopping the steroids, and in fact the rash has almost gone (but not quite) so there is no concern there. My blood counts are lower than last time: haemoglobin 12.3 (OK, this is higher), platelets 143, neutrophils 2.52 and lymphocytes 0.81. The doctor says that the drop is caused by the methotrexate from the intrathecal, and my counts will recover in due course. In any case, they are pretty normal (platelets should strictly speaking be over 150).
All signs of GVHD have pretty much gone. Overall, the mature lymphocytes I got from my brother in February have caused very little trouble. This is good (no symptoms), but maybe also bad because it maybe means they did not attack my residual host lymphocytes. I will find out in May!
One change from the old regime is that the BMT clinic has now got dedicated phlebotomists to take blood. It was a pleasant surprise to see the excellent chap who used to take all the blood when I was an inpatient. He has excellent needle skills, and was definitely the go-to guy for a cannula when he nurses were having trouble finding a good vein.
I will have my next appointment in three weeks time, when they will take blood for the chimerism test. My long term survival really does depend on killing off my original lymphocytes, so these tests are the really important milestones in my treatment.
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