Acute Myelogenous Leukemia (AML)
is a fast-growing cancer of the blood and bone marrow. In AML, the bone marrow makes many unformed cells called blasts. Blasts normally develop into white blood cells that fight infection. However, the blasts are abnormal in AML. They do not develop and cannot fight infections. The bone marrow may also make abnormal red blood cells and platelets. The number of abnormal cells (or leukemia cells) grows quickly. They crowd out the normal red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets the body needs.

Friday, April 13, 2012

Day 123 -- (Day +15)

Friday.  Riley continues to sleep a lot.  He is still doing his "jobs" of walking everyday, showering and mouth care.  He throws in a little facebook time and rolls over again. 
Today is the second day he has retained some fluids since engraftment. We could see it in his face, and his weight was up and output down.  The doctor ordered lasix (used to reduce swelling and fluid retention) and through the end of today he had a 5 liter output!!  The doctor was completely impressed! 

Riley is handling all of the tubing very well.  It would drive me crazy!  He has to watch all of the tubing very carefully as he goes about his day.  I push his IV pole during our walk and we have to stay in sync so he doesn't get tangled or worse.  He of course has to shower with the pole and just moving about is more complicated with so many channels.
Riley's sugar is up, so they separated the lipids (fats) from his TPN (IV nutrition).  This way the lipids can go in over a shorter period of time.  The TPN goes in over 24 hours, lipids now only 10 hours. Without the fats (smaller white milk looking bag), the bag of TPN is just clear and yellow.  Riley and the nurses have debated on what it looks like... we decided on apple juice. The least offending of the choices.  :) 

Labs today:
White blood cells:  1.8  (normal 4.5 - 13.5)
Red Blood cells:  11.3  (normal 13.5 - 17.5)
Platelets:  51  (normal 150 - 425)
ANC:  1278  ( < 500 = severely neutropenic) (normal 2,000 - 5,000)

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