Hello friends!
Today we were at a meet for post HSCT children at the Nanfang Hospital,Guangzhou. It was a great experience which began with a body check up for the children. What followed between breakfast and lunch were a series of lectures by 3 doctors on topics ranging from "The need for chelation post transplant", "A comparison of the chelators available" and "A statistical analysis of the transplant cases and survival rates, etc"
It was nice to see the 'unmasked' faces of a few of the kids who were with Mohanish during the time of transplant and the follow up! It was great to see them all doing well. The joys were more on the faces of the parents...who understood things much better than the kids.
Not everything spoken got to my brain with its limited knowledge of Mandarin, but I guess I got the gist of most of the things!
Some points that got to me(and I understood!)They spoke of a case of a 19 year old boy entering university(their oldest case of transplant-10 years post his transplant from this hospital) and the youngest case of transplant(a 6 months old at the time of transplant) performed last year or so.The oldest case that they have performed successfully was 15 at the time of transplant.
It was nice to see Dr.Chunfu Li with his energy and positive thoughts about the procedure and advances that keep on happening and make him see better prospects in this procedure.
Wrote something when I was in the activity room full of about 50 kids(from those who underwent transplant between 2008 and Jan 2011)-busy playing with the volunteers from the YMCA, Guangzhou.Sharing it with you-
A roomful of life,
Another shot at life...
A roomful of chances,
Something about it strikes
Lives striving for others...
In pain to relieve others',
All with their differences, their tales,
Yet in some way, all just like the other...
A roomful of hope,
A roomful of celebration...
Happiness-part bought, part-got,
A divine intervention?
A roomful of colour
Colours of all that is positive,
A roomful of reiteration-
Of this very LIFE that is!
A roomful of "today",
A roomful of "tomorrows",
Cherished,nourished, laboured, gathered "yesterdays"
With lessons for all to borrow...
A roomful of "me"s and "they"s,
Yet a roomful of "us",
A roomful of dreams come true...
A roomful of love....!
And coming to Mohanish's reports.
1)To start with-Hb-11.8.
The rest of the counts are all within normal limits.
2)Serum ferritin is 685.3ng/ml-no intervention advised for that.
3) His liver functions are on the road to recovery, but will take a few more months to be absolutely normal.
4)A high protein diet for his low proteins. No supplements needed.
5)ECG, 2D ECHO-normal
6)USG abdomen-normal
7)Bone age-normal
Of course, the thoughts of thalpal were with me as I imagined a similar meeting with all you thalpals some day!
Glad to share the joys with you all as always....
Madhavi