DAY 79: We see one case per year...

This is Candace again.
Yesterday was a long, worrisome day for me!
We started around 5 am with 2 bags of platelets and a 3rd bag in the surgery room.
They came and got him around 9am.
They got the port out as planned with no bleeding issues.
The have inserted an IV in each arm so that they can adminster blood, meds, and fluids (since we no longer have the port to do this).

Stuart had a high fever ALL day yesterday...it continued to get higher and peaked out at 104 around midnight and stayed there.
We had poor Stuart packed out in ice - under his arms, behind his neck, on his stomach - he was shivering and so hot you could (in Stuart's words) "cook an egg on his head".

They will not let him have Tylenol as they want to see the "trend" of the fever - when it peaks, how frequently it peaks, etc - will tell them lots of information. So no artificial means of altering the fever... which means Stuart has to suffer through it.

Bless his heart - he is a trooper. He is very brave.

The fever broke this morning around 10 am.
It has continued to go down slowly.
They stopped his antibiotic early in the morning - his labs showed that the levels of antibiotics in his blood were too high.

He started vomiting around 11am and got really bad vertigo (the room spinning), but this passed and they are watching him.

The Doctor of Pharm. came by this morning and told us the bacteria was identified as "Stomatococcus" - a sister of Staph. He also told us that *HE* only has 1 or 2 cases of this bacteria a year.

Our oncologist came by after this and told us they are taking him off the Vancomycin (standard treatment for Staph.) They think Stuart is having a reaction to the Vancomycin. They will start a antibiotic they like to withhold for bugs that are resistant to Vancomycin..."It will be like killing a sparrow with a bazooka", the PharmD said. "Use the Bazooka", I say, "Just kill the sparrow."

So the persistent fever can be because:
1) Stuart is having a reaction to the "old" antibiotic, Vancomycin....OR
2) There is another bug present besides the Stomatococcus that isn't showing up on the cultures.

Either way, he is hoping that this change in antibiotic will fix both of these.

He said he also feels like they still have "control" over the infection.
Stu's vitals continue to be good. Once these start acting up, we could be looking at sepsis.
This is not an option.
This antibiotics will work.

They are giving us until tomorrow for the fever to go (or stay) down...then they start checking the brain port, Cerebral spinal fluid, etc.

The other complicating issue is that Stuart's blood counts have not recovered. His red and white counts are decimated.
By this time in his cycle, they normally are on their way up.
Since Saturday, he has gotten 4 bags of blood and 3 bags of platelets...and continuing to get his Neupegen shots to stimulate the white cells to grow.

They will not let us leave until his fever is gone and his counts are up.
So - home sweet home for now.
And...we are supposed to come back for Round 5 a week from today (for now they are keeping us on schedule). This will be one long hospital stay! :)
I don't know how one goes into a round of chemo when your body is so "down", but I guess we will find out.

So, please pray:
- that these new antibiotic work and the fever STAYS down
- his counts start recovering quickly

That's all for now.
Will update soon.