John is doing well

Hello you all.  Many of you have been asking how John is doing, and I wanted to give you an update.  In many ways, he is doing amazingly well.  It has been four weeks since he came back from being hospitalized, and he has not had to return there.  He has only had to go to Hershey for check ups.  For this I am amazed and grateful. 

His last appointment in Hershey was this past Monday.  The rash turned out to be Graft Verses Host Disease.  This means the donor is rejecting you.  But the rash was mild, and could be handled with medication.  This was not the complication the oncologist was worried about.

The complication the oncologist is worried about is John's Creatinin level.  Technically, John has chronic renal failure.  Yes, his kidneys are failing him, at some level.  His Creatinin level is 3.5.  The Creatinin level shouldn't be over 1.5.  I looked up on the net how high your Creatinin level must be before they put you on dialysis.  The answer is 10.  But I also read that they do it as low as 5.  Hmmmmmm......

Anyway, the fix that the oncologist has decided to do at this time is to lower one of John's meds (an immunosuppressant), which will hopefully lower his Creatinin level.  The only problem with this is, the lowering of the med will increase the chance of Graft Verses Host Disease.  So the oncologist had to significantly increase John's Prednisone, to fight the GVHD.  For those of you who know about Prednisone, it is nasty stuff, LOL.  Mood swings, etc.

Okay, one more thing.  John's counts have gotten higher!  Yay!!!  Finally they got high enough for him to have surgery on the ingrown toe nail of his big toe.  It is doing remarkably well!  He has contracted no fevers!  It is truly amazing.  And the toe is healing nicely.  I don't take any of these small things for granted after so many complications.

Okay, I must run, my in-laws are coming this morning.  Thanks for listening to this update.

I love you all.  :)