Posted by Tyler Ok, once again a very large thank you to everyone who has taken the time to post messages, send e-mails, call on the phone, send regular mail, and pray for me. I feel somewhat inundated with all of the correspondence, but mostly just extremely encouraged. I probably won't be able to respond to everything, because I don't even know where to start, so I'll try to do some here. When things get back to normal, so will I. Ok, well the past few days have been kind of a blur for me. I got the Myelotarg for two hours on Tuesday, which wasn't bad at all. After two more hours, though, I developed a fever of 104 degrees, and it was then decided that the outpatient infusion needed to be changed to a hospital admittance. That was fine with me, because I felt absolutely terrible, but recovered well by the end of the night with the help of a slew of antibiotics and a platelet transfusion. That evening and the next day went well, and it appeared that I might be able to go home the following day, however, my stomach began cramping severely that night (possibly from GVHD since they discontinued my steroids), so I got some heavy pain medication, but I ended up vomiting the whole night and my blood pressure dropped pretty low. The following day, the 6th, was 4 years to the date of the day I was diagnosed with leukemia. Ironically, I spent both days just about the same way. I was listless all day and could do nothing but sleep and just lay there practically motionless as the doctors tried to boost my blood pressure with IV fluids and dopamine. For a while there was talk of moving me to the ICU to get things under control with some stronger drugs, but luckily the measures they took were effective, and I came around on Friday. The doctors and I are still puzzled as to why my blood pressure took such a dive, but it's been hovering safely at the low end of normal ever since. Today, I received another platelet transfusion, and my blood counts are still low and wavering, but that's to be expected with this treatment. All in all, I've felt pretty good since the blood pressure issue was cleared up. I have been having a bad case of the night sweats, but other than that and the low blood counts I'm feeling halfway normal. The doctors discontinued all of my antibiotics today and tomorrow are going to taper my steroids, which I was put on again as soon as the stomach cramping returned on Wednesday evening. The plan is to see if I can walk on my own two feet again and if so to get me out of here as early as Monday, the 10th. So then all of this leaves the question, "How/When do we know if the Myelotarg worked?" It's a tough question. Naturally, if my counts just shot up like crazy, one would assume that the Myelotarg wiped out the bad cells, but the timetable for marrow recovery is unknown. In a week and a half I'm scheduled for another infusion of the stuff (granted my liver function tests still look good, and they're doing fine right now, which is good news), so my guess is we won't see a very substantial increase in blood counts before they're hit hard again. The next dose could also be increased depending on the liver tests, but at only two weeks away from the first infusion, it will be difficult to say if the Myelotarg will have had its full effect on the liver, even though its half-life is only 12 hours. So the possiblility is out there that the second infusion will be of the same dose as the first and that a third dose be introduced sometime down the line. It's all extremely complicated and hinges on a considerable amount of variables, so it's impossible to tell what the next course of action will be exactly. It will also be impossible to ever say whether or not the Myelotarg completely destroyed every single "bad" cell until they bury me at age 86, dead from old age. However there will be a window of time after the second infusion, where a bone marrow biopsy would shed some light on what exactly took place in the bone marrow, and if I'm back in remission as a result of the treatment. So I don't think that much can be determined in the next 6 weeks as to whether or not it worked. Okay, with all of that said, I remain in very good spirits and am back to working on my schoolwork, still very on-track to graduate in May. I am more than likely pushing my return-to-campus date to sometime in April, but I plan on making it for sure, and my doctors are equally determined to have me there as soon as possible. Again, I want to thank everyone who has prayed for me. I continue to believe it has a tremendous effect. Thanks for reading this. I will see you all soon, Tyler
on 3/8/2003, 7:15 pm
Message modified by board administrator 3/8/2003, 6:17 pm
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