I promised to get back with you about the unit of measure which followed Doug’s 412 as computed by the blood bank’s C34 test. The answer is micro liters. As I understand it, that is a lot of stem cells ready for collection. It was a surprise to the technicians who were with us and they were pretty sure they could get the 20 liters Dr. Collin’s group requires in one day. Ok it was a 6 hour day but better than what we had anticipated. Our transplant coordinator had warned us that they scheduled 5 days for collection but usually harvested enough by the 3rd day. Prayer changed that for Doug!
He was in a hospital bed and I sat beside him in a broken “chemo chair”. There were two techs from the blood bank. The one who watched the machine had worked for the company that built and manufactured it, went through the clinical trial period using it and trained end users at all the cancer centers in the United States. He said that 6 months ago a computer version came out but he doesn’t trust his own home computer to work right all the time so is biased towards one that is monitored by a human (solid state cell separator rather than a computer controlled cell separator). He retired from the company and now works part time for the blood bank.
As he was attaching Doug’s lines to the machine (or the machine to Doug’s central line) he told Doug that Doug was about to receive one of the only medical procedures that is painless. One just has to tolerate resting in bed (which Doug is tired of doing!).
The male tech was concentrating on the machine most of the time and the female did paper work as well as other duties in and out of the small room where we were located at the clinic. The operator of the machine determines what cells are coming up the “collect” line. He watches the color and manually controls and fine tunes the flow as needed.
Once in awhile the male tech would sit down. That is when he and Doug talked about cars. He told Doug what he had owned in his lifetime and Doug mentioned his ’67 Chevelle Malibu Super Sport with a 396 engine. Then the tech said he was car poor now. He most recently sold one of his 3 Vipers (a red ’92 with black striping and a silver ’99 with blue striping!) After that Doug didn’t admit to driving a hand-me-down Buick and changed the subject. (Men are funny that way). Doug just reminded me that over the years the guy also owned several Shelby Ford Cobras along with a number of Covets.
I found it interesting that the techs told us that the smaller the individual the longer the process takes. During random conversations he noted that at anyone time only 300 CC of Doug’s blood is in the centrifuge and lines. The plasma and leucocytes (where the stem cells hang out) go into separate bags and the platelets and red cells go back into Doug. Some red cells do get into the collection bag but they are heavier and he watches as the bag layers—the red cells being heavier thus dropping to the bottom of the bag.
He also noted that we all have tumor cells inside us. The difference between someone who gets cancers, although not just this simple, is that the immune system cannot control the multiplication of the cancer cells. If there would be any cancer cells in the collection bag, the intent is that the next chemo Doug is to receive will knock out all cancer in his blood. When the bag of happy cells are put back into Doug 48 hours after the chemo he will again receive injections to build up his immune system until the happy cells graft back into the bone’s marrow and cancer cells can be combated. Stem cells travel through the bloodstream to the bone marrow where they lodge and differentiate into all types of blood cells to help prevent infection and repair the body.
This quote regarding stem cells from Dr. Paul Simmons helped my understanding:
“No other cell in the body has that combination of self-renewal, extensive proliferation and differentiation capacity,” states Paul Simmons, Ph.D., director of Stem Cell Research at the Brown Foundation Institute of Molecular Medicine for the Prevention of Human Diseases at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (IMM). “Understanding how to control the differentiation of stem cells is still a major endeavor that is underway in many labs around the world.”
He was in a hospital bed and I sat beside him in a broken “chemo chair”. There were two techs from the blood bank. The one who watched the machine had worked for the company that built and manufactured it, went through the clinical trial period using it and trained end users at all the cancer centers in the United States. He said that 6 months ago a computer version came out but he doesn’t trust his own home computer to work right all the time so is biased towards one that is monitored by a human (solid state cell separator rather than a computer controlled cell separator). He retired from the company and now works part time for the blood bank.
As he was attaching Doug’s lines to the machine (or the machine to Doug’s central line) he told Doug that Doug was about to receive one of the only medical procedures that is painless. One just has to tolerate resting in bed (which Doug is tired of doing!).
The male tech was concentrating on the machine most of the time and the female did paper work as well as other duties in and out of the small room where we were located at the clinic. The operator of the machine determines what cells are coming up the “collect” line. He watches the color and manually controls and fine tunes the flow as needed.
Once in awhile the male tech would sit down. That is when he and Doug talked about cars. He told Doug what he had owned in his lifetime and Doug mentioned his ’67 Chevelle Malibu Super Sport with a 396 engine. Then the tech said he was car poor now. He most recently sold one of his 3 Vipers (a red ’92 with black striping and a silver ’99 with blue striping!) After that Doug didn’t admit to driving a hand-me-down Buick and changed the subject. (Men are funny that way). Doug just reminded me that over the years the guy also owned several Shelby Ford Cobras along with a number of Covets.
I found it interesting that the techs told us that the smaller the individual the longer the process takes. During random conversations he noted that at anyone time only 300 CC of Doug’s blood is in the centrifuge and lines. The plasma and leucocytes (where the stem cells hang out) go into separate bags and the platelets and red cells go back into Doug. Some red cells do get into the collection bag but they are heavier and he watches as the bag layers—the red cells being heavier thus dropping to the bottom of the bag.
He also noted that we all have tumor cells inside us. The difference between someone who gets cancers, although not just this simple, is that the immune system cannot control the multiplication of the cancer cells. If there would be any cancer cells in the collection bag, the intent is that the next chemo Doug is to receive will knock out all cancer in his blood. When the bag of happy cells are put back into Doug 48 hours after the chemo he will again receive injections to build up his immune system until the happy cells graft back into the bone’s marrow and cancer cells can be combated. Stem cells travel through the bloodstream to the bone marrow where they lodge and differentiate into all types of blood cells to help prevent infection and repair the body.
This quote regarding stem cells from Dr. Paul Simmons helped my understanding:
“No other cell in the body has that combination of self-renewal, extensive proliferation and differentiation capacity,” states Paul Simmons, Ph.D., director of Stem Cell Research at the Brown Foundation Institute of Molecular Medicine for the Prevention of Human Diseases at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (IMM). “Understanding how to control the differentiation of stem cells is still a major endeavor that is underway in many labs around the world.”
Six hours after Doug's treatment began the machine had separated 20 liters 
of what the blood bank will cool than freeze until they are returned to Doug 48 hours after his last chemo treatment next week. A warming process of the blood products takes place first but that is part of “the rest of the story”.
Doug was disappointed yesterday (20th) when he learned that his chemo cannot be given until next week. His white cells are too high—a good thing at some times and not good for the impact Dr. Collins wants to have on the cancer cells in Doug’s body. Doug is still very weak and wishes for more energy which I cannot go out an buy or graft to him.
of what the blood bank will cool than freeze until they are returned to Doug 48 hours after his last chemo treatment next week. A warming process of the blood products takes place first but that is part of “the rest of the story”.Doug was disappointed yesterday (20th) when he learned that his chemo cannot be given until next week. His white cells are too high—a good thing at some times and not good for the impact Dr. Collins wants to have on the cancer cells in Doug’s body. Doug is still very weak and wishes for more energy which I cannot go out an buy or graft to him.
Memorial Day is celebrated early this year so Tuesday is the first day they could schedule the “sledge hammer” chemo that we are not looking forward to yet signal the beginning of the end of our battle to fight back. We know you will be praying with and for us and that support will get us through.
~Carole
P.S. To our friends in the medical field more familiar with blood than I am, if I have misrepresented anything known to you, I’d be glad to make corrections in my blog.
~Carole
P.S. To our friends in the medical field more familiar with blood than I am, if I have misrepresented anything known to you, I’d be glad to make corrections in my blog.
