2nd Rituxan infusion

I had my second chemo infusion yesterday and it went pretty well. I went equipped with snacks, hard candy, ice, and water because the first time I had it my throat was pretty raw and sore during and about a day after. Today I'm ok. Everything taste salty to me, but I guess it's just a side effect of the Rituxan. I am trying to flush myself by drinking lots of water so hopefully it will pass.

Between the Rituxan and the Prednisone, I am having headaches, night sweats, hot flashes, insomnia, insatiable appetite, and just feeling "blah" all the time. I am supposed to return to work on Monday, but I think that I will probably have to take another week off simply because I am not able to get proper sleep at night to function by day and this Rituxan and Prednise just have me a mess. I'm going to give a try though and see what happens.

Home from the hospital!!

Well I got out of the hospital last night after a 16 day stay. Actually, this was my shortest stay ever with TTP. I told the doctor's their were "pretty smart" since they shortened the 30 days I anticipated. I'm still very tired, headaches, and moving a little slow, but still moving on. This treatment was a little different than the others. Since last year's crisis, there has been a clinical trial with a medication called Rituxan (Rituximab), which is a chemotherapy treatment that is supposed to suppress the is widely used in the treatment of B-cell lymphoproliferative disorders, and accumulating data suggest that it may prove an optimal treatment in various diseases related to autoantibody production. Recently, some patients with chronic TTP refractory to any therapy achieved complete remission of the disease after rituximab administration, thus providing the rationale for the use of this drug in ADAMTS13 autoantibody-associated TTP. on the possible effect of rituximab when given in remission to prevent disease recurrencies. I know that's a moutful and I will get back to all of the terminology later, but for right now I will get back to resting. I'm extremely tired so I'll write more later.