Blood infection
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Pam, I totally understand where you are coming from. My Dad was diagnoses in April after being jaundiced dince Febuary. He has still not started chemo. He developed a blocked stent 2 days before his chemo was due, that caused his bilirubin to be 75 which was too high for chemo, to cut a long story short during the stent replacement he too caught a bacterial infection that went into his blood stream, causing his bilirubin to go to 419. He spend a week in hospital and had to have IV antibiotics 3 times a day for 4 days. He is still very weak as he had other complications from the medication. He was supposed to be starting Chemo again next Friday but like you I am going to have to make a call to cancel it as there is no way his bilirubin levels will have fallen enough in time. We are back at the hospital this Friday to have his blood checked and hopefully his external drain took out (it is capped off at moment) If the blood isn’t right then the drain will be put back on and he will have a CT scan. It’s scary and I’m dreading going as we seem to be having problems all the time, we are always two steps back instead of one step forward.
I am sending best wishes and good luck your way, hopefully our next posts will both have more positive news.
Pam….I thought the comment was quite funny. When things are tough a good sense of humor can help bridge the disappointments. As they say on this board dealing, with this cancer resembles a roller coaster ride. It is time for some good luck coming your Dad’s way.
I keep my fingers crossed,
Best wishes,
MarionThanks, hope I wasn’t offensive with the pot hole comment. It’s just our way of dealing with this chain of events. My concern is if this infection is determined to be chemo port related it will have to come out. This will delay my dad’s chemo by about two more weeks. It will mean another port will need to be placed on the other side or possibly a pic line, which I have heard are good. Good news is they are consulting with his oncologist while he is in the hospital and an infection control specialist to determine the source of the infection. I can’t hardly bring myself to call the oncologist’s office to cancel his appointment for Thursday but will do so tomorrow. She will probably come into his room tomorrow anyway.
Pam….stars in sky and whatever it takes to make things move forward; the pot holes are one way of putting it. Although, we are fortunate to have stents they do however, are not uncomplicated in itself. I am glad that they were able to diagnose the infection and as seen before with your Dad the bacteria respond well to the antibiotics. Hopefully, everything else will fall in place real soon.
And onward we go,
Best wishes for a quick recovery
MarionHi I’ve posted my dads story recently and hear is an update. He had an attempted resection in June. A week and a half later he developed a blood infection and was hospitalized again. He was also having stent problems but did not have it replaced at this point. After about three days at home we were back at the ER and he had the stent replaced. A week later he had a port put in to begin chemo. Three days later he got the chills for about four hours with no fever. Then he began running a fever of 103. So back to the ER with a blood infection. Doctors are now determining if it is the same blood infection that was not killed off or a new infection from the port site. The site looks good and they are thinking about doin a scan or needle sample of the site before deciding if it has to come out. My gut feeling is it is the same infection as when he was hospitalized. He may be
able to go home and have an IV antibiotic administered for two weeks or more with follow up cultures. The disappointment is he was to begin chemo this Thursday. They drew more cultures today and if they come back negative he might be able to use the port for chemo soon while on IV antibiotics. Does anyone else out there think all the stars in the sky have to lined up to make progress? We are actually laughing at some of it because my dad says he keeps hitting “pot holes”.
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