ITP & PSC

[Guest guest]

Some of you may remember back at the end of July, my husband----

was hospitalized and diagnosed with Idiopathic thrombocytopenic

purpura (ITP). He also has PSC Stage 3(jan '07) and UC (apr '07).

ITP is another auto-immune disease in which your body attacks your

platelets. ITP comes in two forms: 1) a breif onset of ITP treated

with a brief medication regiment; 2) chronic ITP. ITP can be treated

with steroids, infusion treatments of certain cancer/chemo drugs,

laproscopic Splenectomy, as well as a few other prescription

cancer/transplant drugs.

PSC & ITP are very, very rarely found together. Not much research has

been done on the two diseases when found together. The doctors are

not real certain what the outcome of a Splenectomy will have on the

PSC in the liver.

After numerous months of high doses of steroids, retuxin treatments,

and weekly blood tests, is scheduled to have the Splenectomy

on Nov 19. Since July, we have seen his platelets go from as high as

68,000 to as low as 7,000; normally staying between 15,000-30,000 in

his case. Normal platelet counts are 250,000 to 400,000. Today we

spent the whole day at the hospital preparing for the surgery--

testing, vaccanations, etc. His platelets decreased so much in the

past two days, he will have to go through an emergency transfusion on

Monday to have the surgery on Wednesday and not bleed out. We are

dealing with three great doctors at IU Med Ctr--a hemotologist, a

hepatoligist, and the surgeon.

Some of you may be wondering why I am sharing all of these details,

but we would like others to know this combination of diseases do

exist. When ITP onsets, your life centers around it and your doctors

appointments and blood tests. Random bruising and nose bleeds are

the first signs that your platelets may be too low. We will keep you

posted on the results the Splenectomy has on the PSC. Please keep us

in your thoughts as this is going to be a rocky road for the next few

weeks.