Transplant Time

Whitney will be starting the transplant process this Saturday morning with an outpatient chemotherapy treatment.  Prior to receiving the donor's blood stem cells, the doctors must destroy Whitney's immune system so that it doesn't attack the new stem cells. This will be accomplished by another round of chemotherapy along with whole body radiation treatment called Total Body Irradiation (TBI). The TBI treatment must be within 24 hours of the actual transplant, so timing is critical. The actual day of transplant is Wednesday the 18th and the TBI is scheduled for the morning of the 18th with the transplant expected to take place on the evening of the 18th.

We had been under the impression that this was going to be an inpatient process for the first 30 days and then transition to an outpatient process for the next 70 days. After some discussion, the treatment team decided that the best option would be to try a less aggressive process to destroy her immune system due to her secondary issues. This puts us in a completely outpatient process for all 100 days. We weren't ready to get a place to stay in the city yet and this last minute decision has left us scrambling for accommodations. We have options and will deal with this just fine, we just weren't ready for it and that irritated me.

We will have to be very selective about Whitney's exposures during this process and this is the primary reason why we want to get a private apartment. We will also be limiting visitors during the initial phases of the process to help avoid as many exposures as possible while she is in a compromised state.

I am also working on a recap of Whitney's "vacation" and I might get it done tomorrow night if everything works out.

~Doug