Good medical news

Dear Friends and Family,

Again, this is mostly medical, so skip it if this bores you.

The CT-scan on Mon. showed some good things, not revealed by the x-ray. We got the report yesterday both from Dr. Janus, the pulmonologist, and from Dr. Kurzina, the hem. The lung condition is definitely improving, the clouds diminishing. And though the failure of the various cultures precluded absolute identification of the pneumonia, the very fact that the cultures did not "take" points to PCP, which is the least worrisome, evidently, of possible pneumonias. I am still on the Bactrim and am tapering down on the prednisone, which is giving me apple cheeks and increasing my weight. I am not sure is a further open-chest biopsy will be necessary: perhaps not.

The other good news is that no cracks show in the rib where I fell on Sunday, and that means no danger to the spleen from that event. But it is very painful, and I am taking strong meds for pain, which have their own downside. Sleeping is difficult. I got an additional pain med for night only, but it didn't seem to help much. But this too will pass.

Another piece of good news is that my platelets are up to about 100, the point at which I could be considered for the INCYTE trial. I am eager to try anything that might reduce the spleen size: it is bigger than ever. For Merwin, though, the platelet count has gone up to the 600s, and Dr. K., is concerned about this rise and will see him again in two weeks. If they don't go down, he'll have to take more Hydrea, the chemo that keeps things under control.

We both got our H1N1 shots too. No problem with that so far. OK, that should be it for doctors for this whole week, except I have to phone to see what my WBC (white blood count) is, which will determine when I have to see my hem. again.

Yesterday was Tuesday, free movie day. We got closed out of the Meryl Streep movie, our 1st choice, and decided to see Nine instead. The credits did not come on till the end, and it was fun trying to recognize all the actors in this strange movie, including Judy Dench, Daniel Day Lewis, Sophia Loren and many others. It's a musical, and even Ms. Dench had a musical number. We didn't like it much, however, and can't recommend it. I wonder what others think of it.

Notice that there are no recipes recently; very quiet here on the cooking front.

Love to all,
Bernice