Weekly checkup

Hooray for my liver! He's still doing well, working hard and getting better, Dr. M actually patted me on the shoulder in approval. If things continute at this rate he'll be hoisting me up on his shoulder and carrying me round Princess Margaret Hospital! I have to stay on the same meds at the same rate (Hydroxyurea, or Hydrea, which is a chemotherapy drug often used
first in the treatment of CML. It's lethal to mature leukemic cells and can bring elevated white blood counts back to normal; however, it does not kill many leukemic stem cells in the bone marrow, and therefore does not effectively slow the progression of the disease) But he's considering that I need to start on Nilotinib (brand name Tasigna) because it has fewer liver complications (10 people who had liver probs on Gleevec got transferred to Nilotinib and only 2 of them developed complications) or Disatinib (brand name: Sprycel) which is already on the market and 300 times more potent than Gleevec. You have to apply to the company for Nilotinib and have to have an ECG before-hand but I had a sneaky peak round some websites and found that only 15% of people taking it felt tired and it seemed to have less fluid retention and weight gain than Imatinib/Gleevec - Hurrah! Less pleural iffusions too - double hurrah (I have no idea what a pleural iffusion is and I don't want to find out)