Low counts

Steve's blood work today revealed a possible reason for his fatigue and general feeling of lousiness.

His white blood cell count and absolute neutrophils are extremely low. The white count is 1.5, with a normal range of 4.0-10.5. the neutrophil count is 1.0, with a normal range of 1.8-7.8.

This isn't a huge surprise -- low counts are common for patients on long-term chemotherapy. (White cells in general fight infection -- bacterial, viral and fungal. Neutrophils help fight bacterial infection specifically. If your body is low on neutrophils, you are at a much greater risk of bacterial infection.)

Steve's oncologist has given us the following directions:
1. He's started another course of antibiotics as a precaution.
2. He needs to take it easy all weekend.
3. Tomorrow morning we'll go to Plano Presby for lab work and wait there for results. If his neutrophil count is lower tomorrow than today then he'll go to the ER and get a neutrophil injection.
4. If the counts are not better by Monday, he'll have to delay the next round of chemotheraphy, which is supposed to begin Monday.

In addition to his fatigue, he's been more short of breath than normal -- and normal these days isn't great. His pulmonology appointment isn't until July 17. We had hoped that he would gradually progress or at least stay the same until then.

Our biggest weekend plans are to celebrate Cooper's 7th birthday, which is today, tomorrow. He requested a Fourth of July celebration with Grandma, Papa and Uncle Jim. Steve can just lie on the sofa at the Dallas Damm house all afternoon.