Preparation of a paediatric patient for cord blood stem cell transplant

Unless you have had a friend or family member with cancer, its quite unlikely that you would understand what the patient goes through on a day to day basis. The story that this entry is linked to is about an 8 year old's fight with Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia (ALL). The little girl has already had chemotherapy once to rid her of the disease, but the cancer has returned and she is no longer responding well to the usual cocktail of drugs. Fortunately, funds were not an issue for the family and a " very good matching" cord blood stem cell unit was found and reserved for her.

Treating cancer is serious business, chemotherapy and radiation therapy is extremely toxic and often many patients have side effects from this which either puts them off the treatment, or in cases with poor prognosis, lose their immune systems and succumb to infection or organ failure. I've had friends who have been through chemotherapy and the effects of the drugs can be brutal. But with the lack of sophisticated drugs which can accurately knock the tumorgenic cell out of its aggressive growth cycle, a stem cell transplant (or infusion to boost the immune system post chemo) may be the only answer.

This report gives quite a good overview of a paediatric cancer patient's battle with infection, chemotherapy side effects (vision, sores, poor appetite) , long and boring hospital stays, the 24 hour care required and the absence of visitors. After the transplant, the challenge is to ensure that no graft-vs-host disease develops.

In young children, stem cell transplants may be risky due to their weakened state. However, their positive attitude, care and support by their parents often helps them to make it through much better than older patients, who may not have the same amount of nuturing or emotional support. In our experience with patients undergoing this form of treatment, every bit of support to smoothen the path is greatly appreciated. StemLife takes every transplant case personally and every child that banks their stem cells with us is part of the StemLife family.