KESJ: 17 October 2010

Sunday, October 17, 2010

17 October 2010

T+397

After church this morning, the children were very excited to go to the Teddy Bears' Picnic at Rosehill Gardens. Thanks to Camp Quality, we had been given a family ticket to attend this annual fundraising event for the Children's Hospital at Westmead.

Stephanie and Jeremy had fun on the jumping castle, dancing with the LazyTown characters, making a hoola hoop, having their faces painted and taking their teddy bears to the Bear Clinic. But the highlight was a ride in a mini firetruck, which drove around an empty carpark with its siren blaring - and squirting water out at the bystanders!

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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.