Sick Kids Update

Extraction outcome

Here is a quick follow up to the last post.

The stem cell extraction/harvest at Sick Kids in Toronto was successful and went relatively smoothly. Tuesday, the temporary port was placed in Noah's femoral vein. Though he wasn't able to move around much following the procedure, he was in better spirits after coming out of sedation on Tuesday than he had been the day before with his scan. Different types of sedations, I guess.

Yesterday, after some more tests and preparation, Noah was hooked up to the stem cell collecting machine and had his blood pumped out and back into his body for about five hours. It was a fairly long ordeal which required some "calming" medications so that Noah would not wiggle too much - a tall order for a three-year-old. A unit of blood was used to "prime" the apparatus so that Noah would still have enough blood left in his actual body while the stem cells were harvested from the blood that was in the machine.

Once they had pulled the desired volume of stem cell containing fluids out of Noah's blood, doctors had to ensure the fluids collected contained a high enough concentration of stem cells for the extraction to be considered successful and, to great relief, they had the results they were looking for.

After removing the temporary port, having a heavy duty dressing applied and then receiving one more transfusion, Noah was ready to leave. Without much traffic, Kim and Noah managed to be back home yesterday evening before ten o'clock. Though he did not get nearly enough sleep last night, he was very excited and happy to be home again today.

Round #3

And, of course, now Noah gets to begin his next round of chemo. It will be starting sooner than we had anticipated - on Saturday morning - and this time will be a bit different. As planned, Noah is going to be receiving different and more intense chemo drugs this time. This means that while he is receiving treatments he will have be back in the oncology ward at McMaster. He will only be receiving the chemo medications for three days instead of five so our hope is that he will be well enough to return home on Tuesday. Time will tell and, as with all things, we hold these hopes in open hands.

Thanks

And I know that I have written this before but I, once again, want to share a huge "thank you" on behalf of my family and I to all of you who are supporting us through prayers and by being community to us in so many different and wonderful ways. You are the hands and hearts of Christ and we feel incredibly grateful and loved. We are surrounded by care. Thank you.