It has been a busy few days getting settled on the transplant floor. My mom and Aunt Sugar have been here and today my brother arrived. He will get three days of shots to move those stem cells from the bone marrow out into his bloodstream. It will be a lot easier to collect the stem cells from the blood than from 300 sticks to his butt bones to get them from the bone marrow!!! Brant and the kids also came up for a visit, so it was a fun day of company. I love seeing them! One of the doctors spent time talking to us as a family and I think it helped the kids to hear more about the process and their role in the post-transplant care.
Today I got moved to a little larger room and have my own exercise bike in the corner. The doctor emphasized that I am not sick, I am just getting a bone marrow transplant. Daily exercise before, during and after transplant is one of the greatest predictors of a good outcome. So biking will be added to my walking routine. He said some days I will feel like a 9 volt battery was replaced with a AA, but keep moving....
I have had two days of chemo and have two days left. After the first day of my Busulfan dose, they took six timed blood samples. These made the 6pm FedEx drop and were sent to Seattle for pharmo-kinetic testing. Basically to see how fast my body gets rid of chemo. The results came back this afternoon and the doctor will adjust my last two doses based on the lab results. Talk about seriously personalized medicine!! Very cool.
Tomorrow I start ATG in the afternoon. This is my first immunosuppressant drug. My immune system is being taken out by chemo, but this drug will make sure that any remaining stuff will not attack George's cells and that his immune cells don't attack me. Aaahhh - sibling harmony thru pharmacology. Another fascinating tidbit - ATG used to be grown in horse cells, but a woman scientist from Sloan-Kettering published research around 2002 and showed that if it was grown in rabbits the survival rates for bone marrow transplants patients went way up. Her work was immediately adopted by transplant centers worldwide. Ok, I thought it was cool info....
Better head off to bed. Here is hoping and praying tomorrow isn't too rough.
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2 comments:
We're rocking the transplant process. Not only do you get personalised medicine you finally won the brother-sister battles and have me as your personal donor slave ;-)
BTW - George also thought the 'bunny' info was interesting ;-)
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