Ellen is 4

Ellen had her birthday celebration on the ward this week. She had fun dressed up as 'Jessie' from Toy Story. She is doing pretty well at the moment. We are still waiting for her bone marrow to start working again before we find out if the chemotherapy has worked. We hope to then have a few days at home at which point we will have a proper party.

Update

Ellen is doing as well as can be expected. The temperatures and mucoscitis seem to have stopped, but she is very tired and all her hair has now come out. She is on IV antibiotics and is being fed via naso-gastric tube. We still have a few weeks before her bone marrow will hopefully start to pick up and we will find out how successful this course of chemo has been in attacking the leukaemia.

Lag effect

The effects of Ellen's chemotherapy are now kicking in. She has a temperature and is developing mucoscitis (inflammation of the lining of her gut). She will soon need another nose tube as her appetite has tailed off. These effects will get worse before they get better so we now just sit and wait for her to feel better.

Doing OK

Ellen's Hickman Line went in fine. She has now had three days of chemotherapy and is doing OK. We now have a week more of daily chemotherapy. We will then continue to be in hospital for 4 - 6 weeks whilst we wait for the effects of the chemotherapy to wear off. At this point we will find out if the chemotherapy has worked and therefore what the next step will be.