Mom's Progress and Post Hurricane Update

Today is day 33. That means it has been 33 days since transplant. The last week plus has been a really exciting time to be here as I've watched mom's blood counts soar upward. The counts they watch for mostly are the white blood cell and neutrophil counts. The white blood cells have gone from less than 50 up to over 1500 today. Normal range for white blood cells is between 4,500 and 10,000. As is normal for patients, her blood counts did fluctuate around 1000 since about mid week last week.

As mom's counts have increased, her medications have decreased and therefore some of the side effects that can accompany taking so many medications. Still, the side effects do get her down sometimes. Cards and packages and emails do lift her spirits, so keep 'em coming! She checks everyday. Overall, mom is very lucky and doing well. She is progressing as her medical team expects.

On day 30 (Friday, August 19) they took a test to see if the donor's marrow has engrafted. We may not know these results until Friday. Mom's medical team suspects that the counts rising in the manner they have indicate that they are likely the donor's cells.

Another benefit of mom's counts rising is spending less time in IPOP (the outpatient clinic at the hospital). She visits IPOP every single day. When she is not in IPOP then she's back at the apartment nearby the hospital. Tomorrow is likely to be mom's first full day off from IPOP. This weekend mom was only in IPOP for 45 minutes. This is a record, since she usually must wait there to see what her blood results show in order to see if they need to give her any blood products or if they need to do anything else. This weekend mom didn't have to wait for her full results to come back (this can take 2 hours or more sometimes). There have been several days now in IPOP where she does not require any IV drips, so yet another thing to be happy about.

Regarding Hurricane Irene, we have been very lucky. Aside from some very heavy winds and a lot of rain Saturday night, Baltimore fared pretty well. Some parts of Baltimore do have power outages, but since we are close to the hospital, we have had no interruption in power. One remnant that remains from Hurricane Irene are wigs and hair pieces -- casualties of the wind -- that have found their new homes on sidewalks and bushes.