Day +51: Platelets!

It's official: Zoe is manufacturing her own platelets!

There was a debate a couple days ago about whether to transfuse her the supply of matched platelets that was due to expire that night. I was all for it as I really couldn't stand to see bag go to waste (no, they wouldn't give it to anyone else for some reason), and as I figured that she could probably benefit from a bump.

The doctor explained that with a transfusion of blood product there is always a risk. As her count of 43 was not below the threshold they had set of 30, he felt that the risk outweighed the benefit. Besides, he said, her body had not been chewing up the platelets nearly as fast as it had been, so it might just be possible that she was on the verge of making them herself.

Wise doctor.

The very next day's lab results showed a boost of her platelets to 47. Today they were in the mid 50's. The girl is making them! As I said many posts ago, platelets are the last thing to "come on line" when the new cells engraft. We had heard that it can often longer, but 2 months is long enough for me!

We keep having hiccups with the whole transitioning of Zoe out of the hospital. She gets to a certain point in her hourly NG feed levels, and then she starts barfing. It's difficult to tell whether she had an allergy to the cow milk-based formula, or whether her GI is simply too sensitive. They switched her to goat's milk, but then she barfed shortly after they switched her from fresh goat milk to the powdered variety (for food safety concerns). So now she's back on the fresh goat milk, and we're waiting to see how that goes.

Also, her liver enzymes keep fluctuating. They upped her liver medicine, but there's not much else to do except keep trying to get more food in her gut. There's a whole lot of the "wait and see" approach to dealing with Zoe.

Again, outwardly she's acting like a healthy, boisterous kid who's getting sillier by the day. It's really good to see-- and Jeff and I are just so done with being at the hospital. She's getting more energetic; we are getting more and more exhausted.

In fact, yesterday I ran a red light because I was spacing out. No talking on the cell phone, just simply did not notice that the light was red. I drove into the intersection and almost became the inside of a car sandwich as two cars from each direction headed straight for me. Thankfully they were more alert than I: one swerved, the other braked, and no one laid on their horn. I think we were all too shocked.

Thank heaven for the competency of strangers!