Guest guest Posted June 11, 2008 Report Share Posted June 11, 2008 Hi Eva, Don't panic, this is very common in the early months of Gleevec treatment. Your neutrophils aren't really that low, many members have had lower than that. Ideally they want your count to be 1 or above so you see, you're just barely below that. Many of the top CML doctors will let the counts drop below the 1 without doing anything because they've found that it's not such a big deal afterall. It's a bigger problem when your count gets around 0.5. In the early days of treatment, the Gleevec is killing off many leukemic cells (which are mostly neutrophils) and it takes some time to generate a new population of good healthy cells so that's why your count is low. Give it some time and your count should bounce back up nicely. For a few patients who have problems with chronically low counts, there's a drug called Neupogen which can grow neutrophils so there are other options besides Sprycel if you happen to have an ongoing problem with low neutrophils but you're not even close to crossing that bridge yet so please try not to worry. Take care, Tracey > > Hi gang; I just got home from the doctors and my Gleevec is working too well or something. My wbc is 2.8 . The doctor says my Neutrophils are too low 0.9. She said this leaves me vulnerable to infection so just when I was settling in quite nicely I have to go off Gleevec for a week and if my counts don't improve I may have to switch to Sprycel. I know nothing about Sprycel and now I am very nervous about what will happen next. Anyone that has experienced the same thing , could you please help me understand what this is all about. My doc just kept on saying , I think it will be ok, or it should come back up!! Thanks Eva B > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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