big day

Today George had a central line placed in his chest. that was followed by lab tests. his shots worked very well and he responded really well producing lots of white cells.  This afternoon he was set up on the machine to take out his stem cells. they use the central lines to remove the blood and then to send it back. they harvest the stem cells.  It was a three hour process. tomorrow another session. George remains in good spirits  somehow .  Thanks for all the messages and encouragement.

Friday, Sept. 27, 2013

Today was George's appointment to have a cardiology consult and get his first injections of Neupogen which will make his bone marrow produce white blood cells.  He will inject this for about seven days.

I thought I'd put on my big girl pants and drive us into Boston for the visit.  We've taken cabs other times, as I didn't have enough courage to drive and go to these appointments.

I don't know where they moved the Kneeland Street exit from I 90, but, after circling Logan Airport, and driving all the way back to Cambridge, we ended up in a cab anyway, and 45 minutes late.  Fortunately, our stem cell nurse is great and worked around us.

George will inject daily until his tests indicate he has produced 10 million stem cells that can be taken out (also next week) and readied to be infused back in when he is hospitalized in October.

We go back to the hospital on Monday, (using the gps) and they will insert a catheter in his chest so they can use a central line for the chemo.  If his counts are good, they could start the apheresis (harvesting cells) on Monday.

George remains in good spirits (except for the tour of Logan, but who can blame him) and does a lot of resting.  His worst complaints are fatigue and all the fluid retention in his legs and arms.
He will see a new nephrologist on Monday as well, and hopefully, can get some more meds to reduce the fluid retention.   More to come.

Thanks for all the well wishes. j

George has been approved

Hi, Thanks for your concern about George and me.  If you are reading this, you already know that George has been diagnosed with a rare blood disease, Amyloidosis.  If you look it up, he has the primary or AL type.

Basically, in layman's terms, his stem cells are making Amyloid, which gets into his blood and can destroy the organs and systems.  It's a hard disease to diagnosis, because it is insidious until a major organ is affected.

In George's case, it was his kidneys.  The good news is, other organs seem ok and there is a world renowned specialist at Tufts Medical Center.  We are under his care.

The plan now is that George will take injections that will help produce many stem cells, starting Sept. 27.  Then he will go through a process to harvest a million cells from his blood.  This is a two or three day process on an out patient basis.

He is scheduled to be hospitalized at Tufts Medical Center on Oct. 11, 2013 for chemo and a stem cell infusion of his own cells.  After that, 100 days of laying low to avoid infection.

Right now, George is in the best mood you could expect from someone in his situation.  He is not in pain, but always fatigued.  The issue with his kidneys causes swelling of his legs, feet, arms and face. 

You can e mail him at jgparsons921@gmail.com.  He will be learning to use e mail and Skype!
Thanks for your concern and prayers and wishes.j