Day 5

(<-- Dan in a wig!) Well the first week of treatments is now in the books. Today was a pretty rough day for Dan and according to his nurses this weekend will be the worst part of the 3 week cycle. The chemo, Cisplatin especially, has a cumulative effect so every day is a little worse until it peaks out and by Monday most of the nausea should be better. Yesterday Dan started having issues with his jaw involuntarily moving. He called the nurses and they said to try not taking the Compazine and only doing Zofran & Ativan that night. Today he was feeling pretty crummy so they gave him some Phenergan IV and the shaking became everywhere. He was very restless, arms and legs getting muscle spasms and just moving on their own. He looked like a Parkinson's patient. According to his doctor this is a possible side effect of Compazine & Phenergan type drugs (extrapyramidal reactions or specifically dyskinesia). They gave him some IV Benadryl & IV Ativan and about 1 hour later the tremors & twitching finally slowed down and now a couple hours later he is asleep in bed at home. So this weekend they are going to have him on the Zofran & Ativan plus Decadron to control his nausea.

Hopefully this weekend goes well for him and we can consider the worst part done with. We now know what to expect for the week, we will have a better idea for next cycle what drugs work or don't work for him so it should be smoother. Monday he will go in for lab work and his Bleomycin treatment. That should be really quick and then no doctors for a whole week!