The day started with the flushing of Joe's PICC lines and his daily shot of Neuprogin. Neuprogin is to help his white blood cells to recover from the chemo and hopefully healthy ones will develop and not the Mantle Cell Lymphoma. Joe's hair is a bit thinner. He has a dry irritating cough. He also has a rash around his ankles which is caused by his very low platelets. If you were to ask Joe how he felt, he would tell you he fells great except for being tired.
We both took Max out for his morning business which he is regular at doing. Afterwards we headed over to Pandera as usual for our morning breakfast. Joe always has his grande coffee and a cinnamon roll but today he added OJ. Joe wanted to get our car wash again so he could vacuum the interior of the car which I was reluctant to let him do since he has had several episodes of ringing in his ears with dizziness for about 10-15 seconds but he insisted. There was a $4.00 drive through car wash on the way to the hospital that included do it yourself vacuum. Surprisingly the drive through car wash did a decent job cleaning up the car. Joe had no dizziness issues vacuuming the interior.He was happy to accomplish something.
Lunch was at La Madeleine's on Kirby where we both had a cup of delicious tomato basil soup. Joe enjoyed a quiche lorraine and I had a half of roast beef sandwich. MDACC is only about 10 minutes away from the restaurant making it a convenient and delicious stop.
Joe's first appointment was at 1PM at the Lymphoma Clinic for the Fast Track Lab work and Vital signs. They directed us to go to the Neurology Department right away rather than wait for the appointment time of 2PM. Dr Groves, the neurologist, was out today since his wife had their first child, a baby girl. Good excuse but there were plenty of other doctors to assist Joe. They did a thorough neurological exam and found that he was fine in that area. They want him off the Dilantin for his night time seizures since it interferes with the chemicals used in chemotherapy. So now Joe will be taking two Kepra pills in the morning and two again at night. To wean Joe off the Dilantin, they have directed him to decrease it to 3 pills for one week, then 2 pills the following week, then 1 for a week the zero. We pray that the new medicine keeps his seizures away since they could cause Joe internal bleeding and all kinds of serious issues. Another thing is now added to my worry list.
We headed back up one floor to see Dr. Romaguera who is Joe's principal Mantle Cell Lymphoma physician. We have great faith in his ability to get Joe into remission with all the means available. It is a blessing that there are more therapies now than ever before especially the miracle drug, Rituzimab. There are new medical advances everyday and pray that someone day this disease can be managed on a long term basis. Dr. Romaguera stated that he is pleased with Joe's tolerance of the HyperCVD-R and his blood results. Joe's WBC went from .6 on Friday to 2.8 today (normal low is 4). His platelets went from 5 on Friday to 11 today. His hemogloblin dropped from 9.4 to 8.7. His hematocrit dropped from 30.2 to 27.9. Romaguera ordered a pint of red blood and 6 more units of platelets transfusions for the day but first Joe had to get his blood typed again in the Diagnostic Lab on the 2nd floor. When Joe came out of the lab and started walking down the hall, we had to stop and go back to the nurse since blood was streaming down his arm. They cleaned him up and told him to keep pressure on it for 15 minutes which did the trick.
We reported back up to the Lymphoma clinic to wait for the transfusion orders. There was a hold up waiting for the lab's typing of the blood which finally arrived about 5PM. The nurse came out at 5:30 PM and told us the transfusion appointment was not until 8PM so we decided to go out to dinner at Pappasitos on Kirby and Richmond. What a great meal we had with Joe having chicken fajitas and I had the filet migon fajitas. Boy they were fantastic. I also loved their chunky avocado sauce.
The 8PM transfusion appointment was exactly on time on the second floor of MDACC. They started Joe off with the platelets which took about 1.5 hours total then they started the red blood which takes much longer. We left MDACC at midnight which made it truly a long day. Joe wanted to purchase two more half gallons of OJ and I remembered that there was a Kroger on South Main Street open 24 hours. It was 12:30 by the time we got to the studio apartment. How Max lasted nearly 14 hours without having an accident is amazing. I took him out for a walk since I wanted Joe to rest since the long day takes a real toll on him.
watch over him.
Good grief! It is almost 2PM CST so it is time to say Good Night to all.
Ciao!
Bonnie
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