Boosting The Factory

First, thank you for your warm comments and your Likes on FB. That’s more positive fuel to continue this new blog  adventure.

So the idea of my current treatment is that, since the first treatment didn’t fully work last year, we need to hit harder this time. Like really, really hard. For that purpose, I will go through what is called a High Dose Chemo (5 times the dose I have ever had). But the problem with that is this is going to wipe out my blood system. In other words, this is going to kill my blood cells , and therefore my immune system.

But the good news is (there is always good news!) that I will be able to have my system to restart thanks to something called Stem Cell Transplant. In short, right after the High Dose Chemo (which by the way will only be for 5 days), I will be given my own stem cells back, which will then be in charge of restarting the whole system (stem cells are basically the root cells from which all others cells in your body are created from). You are still with me? Good.And so today, we are going to boost the factory. As you may (or not) know, the bone marrow is where your blood cells and stem cell are produced, therefore I call it the factory. For me to be able to get my own stem cells back after chemo, they first need to be collected (we also talk about harvesting) and stored until needed. And before we collect them, I need to produce a lot of them.

That is why we need to boost the factory. Practically, I will start today to get shots of a hormone factor (commercial name is Neupogen) that will boost the factory. Nothing crazy about it. Just shots. The only side effect I might get is bone soreness. Why is that? Because the factory (remember, the bone marrow) will work full speed, so it is going to overheat a little bit, therefore the bone soreness. But again, nothing that can’t be manageable.

Isn’t amazing what we can do these days thanks to modern medical technology? That will never cease to amaze me.

You see, all sudden you became super knowledgeable about a new subject!

Also, this booster (Neupogen) is used during more traditional chemo to help keep white blood (immune system) at a decent level, since chemo destroys all fast growing cells including healthy cells.

All right, I am getting ready to get my first shot now. See you for the next story!

If you want to know more about Stem Cell Transplant