Tuesday, December 19, 2006

This week's Tuesday Morning's Scribute to 10am:















I went to the doctor yesterday and got a cuppa platelets, to go.

My New Year's Resolution is, for the rest of my life so other people can feel this good, to become a healthy platelet donor. Oh, and to floss more. Flossing is good.

Update: After checking my bloodcounts again yesterday, my platelet levels were just low enough for a platelet transfusion, so I took it. It was a long, crawling weekend since last Friday, and this I needed. Test results are finally coming down to a pinpoint of at least what to treat - ITP caused by aplastic anemia. Doctor thinks my T-cell lympocytes have lost their minds and switched into kill-mode and are now taking it out on the stem cells, which aren't allowed to function properly and produce cells that produce platelets, which causes the anemia deep within the bones.

This is a good example of what unchecked, out-of-control cells can do to the healthy cells around them - when there is no teamwork, you cannot make a system work.


It'll take 3 months of cyclo-something or other to figure out if this is what it is. Yes, this whole idiopathic scenario is one of those things that even the most experienced hematologist thinks, "Well, damn." The doctor drilled down with another bone marrow on me yesterday (I got Ativan, my highly-recommended new best friend), so I hope to know more next week.

Sometime next week, I'm going into the hospital to get 5 days worth of medicines that'll hopefully kick the platelets into production again. I'm way past stir-crazy, patience is not my virtue, I want to be doing something, but I'll do it. And I hope none of this information makes you want to hurl so I can keep people updated. Look at it like this: These are just interesting tests run on the eternal labmonkie who's not quite sure she wants all these beautiful drugs wear off!

2 comments:

bushra said...

oooh, it's not cyclosporin or something is it?

me said...

That's it! ATG IV combined with cyclosporin orally - doctor told me ATG was derived from horse's something, and then my mind wandered off to puffy clouds and sparkly rhinestones over a rainbow because that horse-thought creeped me out. Hey, maybe he meant it's from unicorns instead ;)