Today my wife and I are supposed to be in our new apartment in Chicago preparing for my hospital admission and HSCT to begin at 7:00AM tomorrow morning. Instead, we're in NY doing our regular Sunday routine.
Earlier this week I was in Chicago for final baseline testing and a meeting with Dr. Burt. All went swimmingly and on schedule. I caught the late flight home Wednesday with the news I hoped for, all systems go!
I went to work Thursday morning for the last 2 days in the office for a few months. Early in the afternoon I received a call from Dr. Burt's Nurse Practitioner and from the tone of her voice I immediately knew it was bad news. The blood work I did while at Northwestern came back indicating a compromised immune system, specifically a low B and T cell lymphocyte count. This is a result of the Fingolimod I was taking for MS. Dr. Burt put the procedure on hold for at least one month to clear my system of Fingolimod and allow my body to naturally restore my B and T cell count to a normal level before receiving chemotherapy. Failure to do this could be dangerous because it will take me longer to rebuild sufficient immunity from antigens in the einvironment.
While this is very disappointing news I can honestly say this is the first setback in this process and it could have been a lot worse. The last medication I was taking (Tysabri) required 6 months for metabolic clearance as opposed to Fingolimod with a half life of 6-9 days. Dr. Burt recommends 4 times the half life so one month will be sufficient.
So, I get to work a few more weeks before treatment. I have already received a revised calendar from Kim at Northwestern and the revised start date is April 16th.
No comments:
Post a Comment