Numbers critical ...

Jibs
Dec 21, 2015
2 min read

Bonjour!

Here is the latest news on how Ben is doing. Ben just got over a sore throat and now has some sniffles. We checked hiscounts yesterday (Sunday Dec. 20th), and only received the results this morning. His neutrophils, which help him fight off any infections, are <0.1, nearly non-existant. As the lab technician put it, "critical". At the moment, he has nothing much to help him fight off any virus or infections. This is most likely due to the chemo bringing his counts down to their lowest level yet. If he were to get a fever, we would have to bring him to the hospital for IV antibiotics and probably keep him in isolation. The lab technician also wrote that the counts represent pancytopenia, which just means that all his blood components are very low.

On the positive side, his platelets are up from 21 last week to 58 this week. So as his platelets increase, so will his neutrophils and the rest of his blood counts.

Here is a chart I made to show progression:

The numbers in blue indicate the normal range. I colour coded the cells to show areas to watch for. You can see the effects of the chemo over the last 3 weeks. This sort of

thing should happen during each 6 week cycle, and sometimes reaches these critical levels. The doctors are working on a less severe protocol to keep these numbers within "acceptable" levels.

Ben needs to stay away from large indoor crowds and anyone who has been exposed to a virus or people that have colds until his counts start going up especially his neutrophils and white blood cells.

We hope everyone is settling into holiday relaxation mode. It's nice to spend time at home and, for Ben and Steph, not have to worry about homework, tests and assignments. Sometimes travelling can be stressful so in a way we get to "rest" at home for a little while.