Quote:
Originally Posted by Hopeful
Hi Lisa,
At the AAMDS Conference one of the doctors mentioned that they have found that administering EPO with G-CSF together can be more effective in raising hemoglobin than EPO alone (in some patients). The thought was that it may have a synergistic effect by stimulating the bone marrow.
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I had read that in the AA&MDSIF literature too, Hopeful, so I was kind of glad he was getting them both together at first. I don't know if it actually worked that way for him, though. He got a noticeable WBC bump during ATG when they were giving him daily Neupogen, but then went down to weekly injections for the next 6 months. His WBC when he discontinued it was the same it had been at diagnosis (2.4), and quitting didn't affect his other counts either.
I just hope the Neupogen didn't contribute to his developing the trisomy 8. I've asked his doctor about this, and he admitted he'd heard of that possibility, but there has been no conclusive evidence yet.
He was on Procrit for 4 years, starting a few weeks after the first ATG and continuing on through the second one and thereafter. It was
not enough on its own to keep him from relapsing or having to be transfused and treated again, so I don't see it as an either/or scenario so much as an "every little bit helps" one.