Some Relief

It was IVIG day once again. Krista's blood pressure was low enough today to not need to take her extra blood pressure reducers. Lower blood pressure is consistent with adrenal insufficiency. About an hour into the IVIG transfusion, Krista began to feel extremely weak and light-headed. We were getting nervous about it when we realized that last week she did the same thing in reaction to the benedryl. Once she sleeps off the initial reaction, things seem to go better with her.

I called in to the Santa Barbara oncologist's office to find out the results of the labs that the home-care nurse took before starting the transfusion. The assistant said that everything was good and proceeded to fax me a copy of the labs. We always like to look the labs over to have a feel for where she's at, and this time I saw that her red blood was 8.4. At UCLA, anything below 9.0 requires a blood transfusion, so I called the local office back and asked why they said it was all good. It's just the different offices have different standards, but the local doctor is OK playing by UCLA's rules if that's how we want it. Krista has been borderline for a couple of weeks now, so I think it's about time to bump it up. We are scheduled for an early morning transfusion tomorrow.

The sores in Krista's mouth got really painful today. We wrote an email to the UCLA oncologist yesterday with a question about it, and he got back today saying that he thought the sores might be a virus instead of mucositis. When Krista heard that, she remembered that she had sores like this during chemo the first time and that they had given her Valtrex which helped it. We emailed UCLA that information and ended up getting a prescription phoned into our local pharmacy. The medicine seems to be working, as Krista first felt the sores getting better and then began to have more energy in the evening.

To the LORD I cry aloud,
and He answers me from His holy hill.
I lie down and sleep;
I wake again, because the LORD sustains me.
(Psalm 3:4-5)