Tag Archives: Stem Cell

Stem Cell Transplant

Christian has had his stem cell transplant. It didn’t go too badly but wasn’t a lot of fun, it gives him a sore tummy and nausea as it is given. Bizarrely due to the chemicals used to preserve it, it gives him a strong smell of sweet corn first and he now smells of tinned tomato soup.

He has started to go downhill and the worst of it will come in the next couple of weeks. The chemo will attack his stomach lining and he and will probably give have a very sore tummy, throat and mouth. This is called mucositis, there is not much that can be done about it apart from treating the symptoms and waiting for him to heal. He will probably end up on intravenous morphine for the pain and not be able to eat so will be on nutrition through his NG tube.

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Chemo over

Christian has finished all of the chemo now. He is not feeling too bad, a bit more sleepy than he has been but yesterday he ran around and played hide and seek with me taking advantage of an hour or so when he wasn’t attached to a drip. Today at around midday he will have the stem cells that were harvested a few weeks ago reintroduced. Apparently it can make him feel nauseous and can induce a seizure.

He still loves playing up to a crowd. Here he is in the play room yesterday…

Update – the stem cell transplant has been delayed until tomorrow, because they have decided to give him 72 hours from the end of chemo before he gets it. He needs to be well hydrated for it but as it has been delayed he has now been taken off the drip and has run off to play room with Anna. Watch out plates, here he comes…

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St George’s

Christian has been on very good form for the last couple of weeks. On Wednesday he even went into nursery for the morning, they have made of photo montage for the wall of his day in!

The last few days he has had a bit of a cold and his temperature spiked to 38.5 on Saturday afternoon. Because it was a week after chemo we had to assume he was neutrapenic and took him down to St George’s. One of the children at nursery came down with Chickenpox later in the week so Christian had to have an injection to protect him as, even though he has already had Chickenpox, the chemo will have killed his resistance to it.

He has probably got a viral cold which is relatively harmless, but they have to follow protocol and treat it as an antibacterial infection. He is on intravenous antibiotics and they will keep him in for 48 hours while they try and grow cultures on a blood sample. If nothing is grown in that time and he doesn’t get another temperature and he seems well in himself, he will probably be allowed home.

Danny, Claudia’s sister, took some photos of Christian last week while he was having his stem cell harvest. Here is one…

stem cell

Dans is off to Montenegro to turn around the local property market. Our boys are really going to miss her. Here she is doing what she does best, making them laugh and spoiling them rotten…

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