DLI Postponed For Now

Just when I had mentally prepared myself to receive my donor cells tomorrow, it turns out I won't be getting them after all. It has been a roller coaster of a week with the whole DLI situation...

This morning I woke up with even more lesions all over my body. Not only were they on the right side of my body, but they travelled to the left side also. When shingles is present on both sides of the body it's considered to be severe enough to get admitted to the hospital to get drugs intraveneously. This afternoon Chris went to Stanford to meet with my BMT doctor to get some pain medication for me. He prescribed vicadin along with another strong drug used to relieve nerve pain. This afternoon while I was at work, my BMT doctor called me to let me know that he had spoken with some specialists at other institutions (that have more experience with DLI's) and that they all agreed I should not have the DLI until my shingles are gone and I have been off of prednisone for a few weeks. I guess the chances of me getting life threatening GVHD are high with both having shingles and being on prednisone. So for now my donor's cells will be frozen until I'm ready to receive them.

Tomorrow I'm supposed to call both of my doctor's with an update on my shingles. If it gets any worse and/or I get a fever higher than 100 I will most likely have to get admitted for 5-7 days. My chemo will probably also be delayed for a couple of weeks, which I'm not very happy about.