All systems GO...

Saw Leanne, the Haemotologist today. She is very happy with how things are proceeding thus far and all is looking good to fire ahead with the transplant. The CT scan last week shows lymph nodes all under the magical 10mm size threshold and show that the last two lots of chemo have been effective. All their other tests and monitoring seems fine.

I still have a routine/mandatory pre-chemo heart ultrasound; a respiratory function test and an ECG before the next chemo starts. I get my PICC line inserted early on Monday June 21st (happy birthday Murray!) and they will do the ECG and all the hospital admission stuff that day to save the bureaucratic stuff later.

Thursday 24th they start the chemo, kicking off with some BCNU as an entree on the first day, followed by 4 x days of Etoposide au naturale over the next four days. Although admitted as a patient, I can possibly come home for chunks of the first couple of days. Tuesday 29th we finish with a cheeky little desert number called Melphalan.

Wednesday 30th June they re-infuse my peripheral blood stem cells and I begin the process of recovering from the chemo clobbering, which I'm told is quite a bit more solid than anything I've had thus far. Although I've seemed to get off quite lightly before, they said to be in no doubt that this time will be considerably more of a battering.

We had time this afternoon with a variety of folk involved in the whole process. It was good to get a lot more clarity (much abridged in this little epistle) and plenty of reading material to bone up on beforehand. I quite like trying to get a reasonable understanding of the process and sequence of what happens.

We'll try and keep yáll posted on developments as we go.

Cheers
Bruce

1. A bicycle can't stand alone; it is two tired.
2. A will is a dead giveaway.
3. Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.
4. A backward poet writes inverse.
5. In a democracy it's your vote that counts; in feudalism, it's your Count that votes.
6. A chicken crossing the road: poultry in motion.
7. If you don't pay your exorcist you may be repossessed.
8. With her marriage she got a new name and a dress.
9. Show me a piano falling down a mine shaft and I'll show you A-flat miner.
10. When a clock is hungry it goes back four seconds.