Cancer Johns Hopkins - Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center Mantle Cell Lymphoma (MCL)

Fourth Month of Remission

For the Love of Family... Together.
For the Love of Family… Together.
Kaiser Permanante called to say that my latest PET/CT scan showed no active lymphomas. I am now in my fourth month of remission since my February 2020 PET/CT scan.
 
I do have an enlarged and impaired spleen due to my bone marrow transplant. They will continue to monitor me every two weeks, with my next abdominal ultrasound in two months and my next PET/CT scan in three months.
 
It means I may go for months, years, or the rest of my life with a depressed platelet count. I was unaware that the spleen was responsible for platelet counts. Kaiser Permanante and Johns Hopkins will be discussing this further with us.
 
We are very thankful to God and to all our family & friends for their love and support these past two years. 💕🙏🏻✌🏻
 

I am still immunocompromised (neutropenic, lymphopenic) due to my chemotherapy. I will still undergo “maintenance chemotherapy” for the next 3 years to keep my cancer at bay. What this means is I may have a fighting chance of beating this cancer.

In speaking with a good friend and former co-worker from Sophos, I’m told the spleen is the organ that removes platelets from the bloodstream, so if it is overactive, it will remove them too soon (causing a reduced platelet count and lowering your ability to clot in response to injuries or cuts).  In his case, they discussed removing his spleen.

Kaiser Permanante tells me they will be monitoring my blood weekly, doing abdominal ultrasounds every 2 months to monitor my spleen, and full-body PET/CT scans every 3 months to monitor my cancer (and hopefully my continued remission).  We have to ask if that is what they suspect with my spleen and platelets, it wasn’t well explained by my Kaiser oncologist, but I’m hoping Hopkins will be thorough in discussing it with us.

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Jane
3 years ago

Glad to hear of your contuinued remission. Hoping for an improvement with your spleen.