Barb

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 8/9/00 8:33:38 AM Mountain Daylight Time,

thenshaw@... writes:

> Still he

> should be man enough to hang in there with us.

Barb,

I don't think gender has anything to do with it actually. All of us are sick

and very sensitive sometimes because of that. I want to be free to say what

I think without being called " ignorant " . Who is anyone to judge another

person?

My 2 cents,

Dianne A.

[Guest guest]

HGB is Hemaglobin

MCHC is mean corpuscular hemaglobin concentration

The others I'm not sure of but aren't all that important.

I would be greatly concerned that Ken's liver is decompensating

significantly. Breast growth in men, abdominal girth growth with weight

gain in someone with liver disease means that the liver is not

functioning as well as it was. I would suspect he is developing ascites.

The US should have shown this and may need to be repeated. Breast growth

is due to the failure of the liver to convert the precursor of

testosterone produced by the testes and adrenals to active testosterone.

This happens as the liver disease worsens. Weight gain can also occur as

the liver fails and increases in size to try to compensate for not

working as well as before.

Is he feeling full soon after starting to eat? Is it more difficult to

bend over and put on and tie his shoe laces? Are his pants too tight to

do us easily? All these are signs of either ascites or liver

enlargement.

As for the poll about Chicken Pox, there is a significant problem with

this idea. That is the fact that most of the population has had Chicken

Pox. In fact it is one of the most common viral diseases known to man.

As is CMV.

Thanks for sending me the website for that article. I'll check it out.

This was an expected problem. As soon as we start using an antiviral or

antibiotic on a regular basis, resistance arises. This is going to make

the post-op period a lot more dicey for some folks who are CMV negative

and receive a CMV positive organ. I was one of those folks and took

Gancyclovir for 6 weeks post tx.

I would suggest Ken get checked out again, soon.

A good physical examination will determine if his liver is enlarged and

also detect ascites both of which would be confirmed by an US.

Aubrey