Another Good Result at Mayo
At the end of the 53rd 28-day cycle on the pomalidomide study, I'm happy with the results once again.

Cancer markers: IgG is up slightly, from 1100 to 1290 mg/dL, but that's were it was in November and February, so it's not scary, and part of the increase may be good IgG responding to the surgery. M-spike came up a bit too, 1.0 to 1.1 g/dL, but that increase was less than the increase in IgG. That's very nice. Lambda and kappa light chains did their usual bounce too, this time down, nicely into the reference range.

Neutrophils: These cells are the first responders of the immune system, always on the alert, and they are up 250% from last month. Since there is no evidence of any infection, Dr LH believes that this increase is my body's normal response to the hernia surgery 16 days ago. See Too Late to Back Out Now. Actually, I'm tickled to see that my supposedly-compromised immune system is able to respond that well to a perceived threat.

Calcium: Last month calcium was 10.3 mg/dL, slightly over the top of the range, but today it was 9.6, comfortably below. Dr L said that hydration makes a big difference, and I did make an effort to hydrate properly this time. Now I'm a believer. One happy interpretation of the reduction is that last month's high reading most likely did not come from bone lesions, because those don't stop sending calcium into the blood.

Rash from Bactrim: I mentioned to Dr LH that Bactrim (sulfamethoxazole) caused a rash on my leg. She asked if I had confirmed that by going off until the rash went away, then going back on again. I have not confirmed it, though the time-correlation was too stark for me to doubt. I may get a chance to confirm it sometime in the future, but I'm not going to take Bactrim as a prophylaxis, only if I know of an infection that it might fix.

Most-Recent Test Results:

Test    Jan 12    Feb 07    Mar 08    Apr 04     Remarks
M-spike g/dL 1.2 1.1 1.0 1.1 \ Tumor marker
IgG mg/dL 1190 1280 1100 1290 / Tumor marker
Lambda mg/dL 2.24 1.99 2.80 2.24 L Free light chains
Calcium mg/dL 10.0 10.2 10.3 9.6 High
Creatinine mg/dL 1.0 1.0 1.0 1.2 Kidney, OK
HGB g/dL 15.1 15.2 14.2 14.6 Hemoglobin, OK
RBC M/uL 4.36 4.18 3.86 4.08 Red cells, low
WBC K/uL 4.8 4.5 3.7 6.1 White cells, normal
ANC K/uL 2.40 1.70 1.50 3.80 Neutrophils, way up

Related Links:

My Myeloma     A discussion of my myeloma, not very technical.
My Treatment History Not technical.
My Test Charts Graphic displays of several key test results over time.
My Test Result Table Somewhat technical. Best with a wide browser window.
My Supplement Regimen With links to where I buy them.