Monday, April 20, 2009

April 20

After his blood transfusion last Thursday Luke has had some good days. A bit more energy and appetite and no headaches or nausea.

Today's labs were as expected. Hemoglobin is up a little (8.5) but still low, white cells are still almost non-existent at 200 and platelets dropped to 30,000. He finished his cybertine on Saturday. Last time low counts came about a week after the last dose of cybertine.

Wednesday Luke will get the first dose of the replacement drug for PEG asparaginase -the drug he had the allergic reaction to. For those interested and since I have nothing else to to this evening here's some information about asparaginase and what it does. L-asparaginase is an enzyme that breaks down L-asparagine which is produced by normal body cells. ALL cancer cells don't produce L-asparagine so they need to get their supply from the blood to grow. PEG asparaginase reduces the L-asparagine in the blood. Without a supply of L-asparagine the ALL cancer cells starve and die.

Asparaginase Luke gets is derived from E.Coli. PEG Asparaginase has a coating that has a time release effect that keeps it in the body for an extended period. The new drug Luke will get is Erwinia L-asparaginase which does not have the coating to keep it in the body. Consequently Erwinia L-asparaginase needs to be administered in lower/multiple doses, so the Lukester gets to go to MDA M-W-F for two weeks to get his dose. He'll get to hang out a few hours each trip to watch for allergic reactions similar to PEG asparaginase.

The sisters planning for the May 30 blood drive and Leukemia Society fund raiser continue. Hope to see a good crowd. Been trying to convince Luke to put on a benefit concert that evening - would any of the blog readers out there donate to the Leukemia Society to hear Luke play and sing?

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