J&B SHARRATT: September 24, 2016

On Monday, September 19, we had our follow-up visit with Dr. McCarron as we had finally completed Chemo round #1. She was pleased to hear that Brian had felt pretty well after the last three weeks and his blood work he had that day was also in the ranges that she was happy with. So Tuesday, Round #2 would start with an increased dosing in his CyBorD chemotherapy and he also was due for his next monthly pamidronate injection which is the bone strengthening drug. So back to Grand River on Tuesday for the start of the second round. He got the bortezomib injection in the belly and this time his cyclophosphamide was 16 tablets and the Dexamethasone was 5 tablets. The pamidronate was an IV in the arm and they sent us home with what looked like a baby-bottle attached to his IV which I was to remove once the medication had administered over a two hour period. All was going well, I was able to take out the IV from his arm without too much trouble - they will make a nurse out of me yet! Otherwise, Brian was feeling not too bad. He had trouble sleeping that night but the next day he didn't feel too bad and was able to spend his day normally.

Then on Wednesday night he started to feel unwell, started to get severe diarrhea through the night and was feeling quite nauseated. As the morning progressed, I became quite concerned, so phoned the doctor's office and they were concerned that Brian might have picked up yet another infection - this time C. difficile. This is a bacteria that lives in our gut and in immunocompromised patients it is hard for the body to fight. She wanted me to bring Brian in to Kitchener as they felt he needed hydration and wanted to do some stool samples to check for C. difficile. So off we go to Kitchener and they had set up a bed with IV right in the cancer clinic examination room for Brian which magically had a "flushing" toilet that pulls out from underneath the sink in a cupboard. Who knew what they hide in their cupboards! They had me bring Brian directly into the clinic and he was not to sit down or be anywhere near other patients (just in case he had C-diff). So four hours of IV was given in the clinic and they were able to get a stool sample and send it to the lab. Brian started to feel a bit better with the IV hydration and Dr. McCarron decided that he could go home for the night but we had to come back the next day for more hydration. It took us a good hour to get home that night due to traffic at rush hour in Kitchener. Brian in the meantime was starting to feel quite nauseated in the car and thank goodness I had the foresight before we left the house that morning to put some bags in the car in case he was sick as we definitely needed them!

So back to the clinic the next day for more hydration and the preliminary report on the stool culture did show one part positive and one part negative so Brian was isolated again from other patients and given his hydration, so another full day spent at the hospital by the time they did more blood tests and the waiting around for results. Dr. MCarron finally came to see us mid afternoon to say that she was happy that his blood work, moreso his biochemistry was back up in the normal range. Apparently the day before the blood work was showing high potassium and something to do with his GFR which can be indicators of kidney failure. So with the IV hydration, his blood work had all come back into the normal range. She was still waiting on the final report on the stool culture and decided that Brian would be ok to go home without admission to hospital but she set up Home Care to come in and give him IV hydration both Saturday and Sunday. Chemo scheduled for this coming Tuesday was now cancelled but we have to do blood work on Tuesday and as long as that is coming back okay, then chemo would resume the following Tuesday (Oct 4). In the meantime on Friday night, Dr. McCarron called and said that Brian actually DID NOT have C-difficile on the final pathology. That was good to know but now we are wondering what did cause him to become ill. Was it just side effects from the chemo and his weakened immune system? It just seems that they really don't seem to know what causes things to happen and I guess there is really nothing that Brian did wrong, it just makes us so much more aware of how our immune system works and how much it does protect us and when someones immune system is compromised, you are so susceptible to all kinds of viruses and bacteria that are everywhere in our environment. It is almost making me become a germaphobe!

So the week certainly didn't go as we had hoped but we are just taking each day as it comes and deal with whatever comes up! So I will end this post with some pictures as promised - one of Timmie taking care of Brian while he is getting his hydration at home today and some of the drawings I was telling you about in my last post. Brian has not felt well enough to work on anymore drawings this week but maybe he can get back to that next week.