Yesterday was a day for us to relax and catch up on things. I want to follow up with what happened to lead Stevan to be released.
Stevan felt so much better on Wednesday morning. He had not ran a fever since Monday night. He had not had his Vancomycine since Sunday night. Dr White had ran a bone scan and saw that the infection had been responding to the antibiotic and looked better than before. His Potassium was on the low side, so they gave him some per IV and in a couple of pills and then was able to have his picc line removed. They sent the end of it to the lab to check for bacteria or infection.
They have increased his hydrocortisone in the AM from 20mg to 60mg and the PM from 10mg to 30mg for the next three days and then go to 30mg in the AM and 15mg in the PM for the next 30days. He will have an appointment with an endocrinologist on Aug 24 to talk to us about his adrenal insufficiency and how to continue to treat it.
Dr Holter came to visit Stevan and examine him. She said that she wants to wait to do the transplant for at least a month or two. She said that his kidneys are on their way back to being normal, but he must hydrate himself well with water to clean them out and help them to heal.
Before we left the hospital, I asked for copies of the blood work since we were there on Monday. Last night I got to looking at them and to my surprise I found out something that some of my MM readers had commented on and told us to watch for. I had posted before that Stevan's M spike on June 20th was Monoclonal IGA Kappa #1 = .5 and #2 = .1. On last Friday's visit, July 27, his blood test showed his M-spike to be .2 with a small M-skike noted in beta/gamma region. So what does this mean? His M-spike is still dropping and he's not on any maintance therapy.
With all of this combined, we feel like this is an answer to prayers. We hope that in a couple of months maybe his M-spike will be at zero. Definately something to look forward to.
Us before Myeloma
Celebrating our 5 year Anniversary a few days early. Wow! We've both changed over the past few years.
Showing posts with label potassium. Show all posts
Showing posts with label potassium. Show all posts
Friday, August 3, 2012
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
He's feeling Normal...LOL Day +7
In Stevan's words to Dr. Jennifer Holter this morning, "I don't feel any different than I normally do." He has had arm and back pain and diarrhea from his adrenal gland not working for so long, what he's going through now seems like no big deal. After eating a few bites of his breakfast, he slept several hours this morning. He's still got some pain in his right upper ribs, but it is better than it was.
We are trying to get his diarrhea under control with Imodium every 4 hours, but haven't reigned it in yet. We are keeping his nausea in check with Zofran, Ativan, and Phenergan. We have found if he takes either Zofran or Ativan before he eats, he doesn't get sick. If he's feeling sick to his stomach around bedtime, Phenergan helps and puts him to sleep. So far he has not experienced major Mucositis, which is sores in his mouth. As of this morning he has just a small sore, so his Chlorhexidine Gluconate (Peridex) oral rinse is working. Today he has been drinking a lot of water. I'm guessing he's slightly dehydrated since he's craving water.
Stevan has become very sensitive to the smells around him, to the point his food doesn't smell good. I had to laugh this morning when he said his eggs, pancake, and sausage tasted like it smelled... "well I would hope so" is what I was thinking. He has not had much of an appetite, but has forced himself to eat a little each day. He says everything taste like cardboard. Even the chocolate milkshake I got him tonight tasted like chalk, but he drank about half of it, along with the patti from his hamburger I picked up for his dinner. As you have guessed, we both are tired of the hospital food, so I've been picking up a few things that sounds good to him locally around the hospital.
His counts for today were
White Cell .2
Red Cell 3.47
Hemoglobin 10.8
Platelets 52
He had a low potassium count last night so they gave him 40 mEq through his IV.
I must say we are are very blessed that he's not experienced severe symptoms so far. They say he will loose his hair, but so far its hanging on. This morning the doctor said she's expecting us to be here another 7 to 10 days. They say his numbers will continue to come down before they go back up. So we will continue to wait.
We are trying to get his diarrhea under control with Imodium every 4 hours, but haven't reigned it in yet. We are keeping his nausea in check with Zofran, Ativan, and Phenergan. We have found if he takes either Zofran or Ativan before he eats, he doesn't get sick. If he's feeling sick to his stomach around bedtime, Phenergan helps and puts him to sleep. So far he has not experienced major Mucositis, which is sores in his mouth. As of this morning he has just a small sore, so his Chlorhexidine Gluconate (Peridex) oral rinse is working. Today he has been drinking a lot of water. I'm guessing he's slightly dehydrated since he's craving water.
Stevan has become very sensitive to the smells around him, to the point his food doesn't smell good. I had to laugh this morning when he said his eggs, pancake, and sausage tasted like it smelled... "well I would hope so" is what I was thinking. He has not had much of an appetite, but has forced himself to eat a little each day. He says everything taste like cardboard. Even the chocolate milkshake I got him tonight tasted like chalk, but he drank about half of it, along with the patti from his hamburger I picked up for his dinner. As you have guessed, we both are tired of the hospital food, so I've been picking up a few things that sounds good to him locally around the hospital.
His counts for today were
White Cell .2
Red Cell 3.47
Hemoglobin 10.8
Platelets 52
He had a low potassium count last night so they gave him 40 mEq through his IV.
I must say we are are very blessed that he's not experienced severe symptoms so far. They say he will loose his hair, but so far its hanging on. This morning the doctor said she's expecting us to be here another 7 to 10 days. They say his numbers will continue to come down before they go back up. So we will continue to wait.
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