Dad Update - Chemo Cycle Two and complications

So dad went in to St. Mary's as planned on Saturday to begin his second cyle of chemotherapy. Things seemed to go pretty well for the first couple of days: not too many side effects, blood counts were good, no fever, etc. Yesterday I called and he had been transferred to the medical intensive care unit. Apparently he began having trouble with his breathing and they were concerned that they might need to intubate him. Fortunately they did not need to do this, instead they placed an oxygen mask on his face to help him breathe better.

They couldn't immediately determine what was causing the respiratory distress, but the staff seemed to think it could be a couple of things. The first option was that it might be a reaction to the chemotherapy drugs... a side effect that occurs in about 30% of patients. This would be bad, these chemotherapy drugs are the only treatment option dad has and without the treatment the doctor believes he might have only a matter of weeks to live with this type of cancer. So we were all hoping and praying that it wasn't that his body couldn't tolerate the drugs.

The second option was that he was possibly having some cardiac issues. This was unsure though because he didn't seem to be exhibiting any major cardiac symptoms. So this was a theory that relied on the "wait and see" method.

Dad was also running a fever and had some elevated white blood counts (this is good, rather than having no white blood cells at all!), both indicating that there may be some sort of infection. This could also have caused the respiratory problems as well. They started him on antibiotics right away.

This morning I spoke with his oncologist who explained that he didn't think it was a reaction to the chemotherapy, much to my delight! Thank God that it's not likely a side effect, that would be very difficult to deal with and treat. Rather he said that dad's blood cultures came back as positive for infection. They still haven't determined exactly what kind of infection, but the nurses say he seems to be responding to the antibiotics well. He doesn't have as much of a fever, or none at all - so this is very good.

Through out the whole ordeal he has struggled with some confusion and agitation. They needed to give him a sedative last night because he was becoming increasingly agitated with the mask, and he needed to calm down a bit. It seems that dad is very sensitive to sedatives, the couple of times he's had them he always experiences heavy side effects the next day. Like the last hospital visit, he was confused this morning and has had great difficulty in speaking. It's difficult for him to articulate words and responses. I spoke with him last night, this afternoon and tonight and he seems to be making remarkable progress in this respect. So I will be hopeful for some more improvement tonight.

UPDATE 12/5/08: Dad was moved back to the Oncology wing... it seems that his breathing improved enough and his infection was responding well enough to the antibiotics. He's happy to be back on 5SW but wishes he were out of the hospital...they apparently have him on a "soft diet" to avoid swallowing problems. He's not liking that!