KESJ: Bravery beads

Friday, October 9, 2009

Bravery beads

These are Jeremy's bravery beads (click on the picture to see it larger). Thanks to Cure Our Kids, Jeremy collects a bead each time he has a procedure. For example, the red beads are for blood transfusions, the various cat beads are for tests and scans (eg. X-rays, fungograms), and the big pretty bead on the top right is for his bone marrow transplant - click here for more information. He is up to his third strand, and he is keen to thread on his beads all by himself!

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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.