Long Story to Update You All

Sorry I haven't posted anything lately. We were doing fine until 10/14 when Jim's right hip dislocated (it was the left hip twice in July) while we were at our house on LBI. Went to local ER where it was manipulated back into place. Jim was doing fairly well, although still netropenic, when that right hip went out again on 10/24 AND again on 10/25--both times manipulated back into place under general anesthesia in OR in Virginia Hospital Center. But this time Jim continued to have severe pain in hip and two orthopedic opinions recommend revision surgery. Well he's not a good candidate for surgery with no active immune system (risk of infection too high) so the oncologist recommended waiting to see if neutrophils come up and, if not, giving him a shot of Neulasta (a long acting Neupogen-like drug to raise neutrophils). Then last week he was hospitalized at NIH with a rapidly falling hemoglobin (hgb.) (oxygen carrying red blood cells). A CT scan showed a huge hematoma (pooling of blood) in the muscle of his right hip. The docs theorized that the bleeding caused the falling hgb. and the pain--all this from the trauma of 3 dilocations and 3 manipulations. They transfused him with 2 units of blood and monitored hgb. 3x/day until it tapered off. He was discharged on 11/10 and we go twice a week to check CBC (looking at hgb. and neutrophil counts). So we're waiting and being EXTREMELY CAREFUL with his right hip. Next week (11/19) we will have a reevaluation of his CLL and lymphoma at NIH. Barbara,