33,000 Platelets!

Jo's CBC this morning showed a whopping 33,000 platelets, up from 28,000 last Thursday. Her platelets seem to be growing by about 1,000 per day. The rest of her counts have been holding steady and no transfusions have been necessary.

Today, Jo had an MRI of her hips and knees. She has had some discomfort come and go in her knees. She has always said that "I make her weak in the knees", but this seems to be different.

Once Jo's platelets get up over 80,000 or 90,000, she will be eligible for some sort of treatment for her hip pain. In about a week, we will have the results of her MRI and we'll be able to see if her Avasular Necrosis is...

1) Getting Better
2) Staying the Same
3) Getting Worse

I'm starting to sound just like Dr. Alvarez, eh?

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Anna has been searching for 4-leaf clovers, hoping they might bring a little luck for her mom. Anna has also been practicing biting the shamrocks with her FIRST TOOTH!

Jo did have to have transfusions last Saturday, so it's kind of tough to know exactly what her counts are doing. The transfusions drive the counts up, making it impossible to know what would have happened without them. While Jo's platelet counts seemed to be coming up, her red blood cells had dropped far enough to require a transfusion. After ATG, it is not uncommon to see the different components of blood production respond at different rates.

Jo will see Dr. Alvarez on Thursday for the first time in over a month. It will be interesting to get his comments.

Progress!!!

I hate to jinx anything, but we do have news that we have not had in over 16 months. Last Thursday, Jo's platelets were 14,000. On Friday, they were 15,000 and today, they were 21,000. Although these are very exciting numbers, we are not yet quite ready to run naked through Larimer Square as did Bronco fans after the 1998 Super Bowl victory. However, if you live in Highlands Ranch, you may want to peek out the window now and then...

Back Home Again

Jo and I came home from the NIH on Saturday night. Little Anna and my mom came back to Denver from Minnesota on Tuesday morning. It is great to be home and we are all settling back into a routine.

Jo is getting close to being back to full strength. She will now send blood samples back to the NIH every week and we'll fly back to Bethesda in 3 months for our first checkup. Every day she takes cyclosporin, which is a drug that suppresses her immune system and gives the ATG a chance to do its job. With a little luck, we will hopefully see improvements to her blood counts within a month or so. Stay tuned!!!