KESJ: 24 October 2009

Saturday, October 24, 2009

24 October 2009

T+39

After an early morning platelet transfusion, Jeremy was subjected to a throat swab (as the doctors are concerned about his lingering dry cough). Said throat swab caused him to gag and vomit - over his bed and Mummy's jeans! However, after everything had been cleaned up, he was allowed to go home on Gate Pass.

Since his overnight nasogastric feeds were changed from Neocate to Isosource (which has more calories per ml) on Thursday night, he has experienced bad diarrhea during the daytime. The doctors have switched him back to Neocate tonight, and hopefully this will resolve his poo problems!

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Definitions

Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL) - a rapidly progressing cancer of the blood and bone marrow. ALL affects the type of developing white blood cells known as lymphocytes. It is the most common form of childhood leukaemia, and the most common type of childhood cancer. It also occurs in adults.

Blast cells - immature blood cells normally found in the bone marrow. Blast cells normally constitute up to 5% of all bone marrow cells. These cells divide and replenish all the normal blood cells in the marrow and circulating blood. Acute leukaemia is characterised by an accumulation of abnormal blast cells that take over the marrow and spill out into the blood stream.

Bone marrow transplant - the process of replacing bone marrow cells (stem cells) that are unhealthy, with stem cells that are healthy. The healthy stem cells are re-infused intravenously through the central line, after very strong chemotherapy and/or radiation to kill unhealthy stem cells. The re-infusion of healthy stem cells essentially rescues the patient from the chemotherapy and/or radiation, by enabling his or her bone marrow to start producing new blood cells.