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Joshua

Just three days after Christmas, my world was turned upside down. I was admitted to the hospital because I was unable to keep any food down and felt terrible overall. Upon admission, I had a multitude of issues, just a few being extremely high uric acid levels, severe dehydration, pancreatitis, and nephrosis. They also discovered that I had lost 20 lbs.! Later in the hospital, I would lose 20 more.

Essence

Joshua

Just three days after Christmas, my world was turned upside down. I was admitted to the hospital because I was unable to keep any food down and felt terrible overall. Upon admission, I had a multitude of issues, just a few being extremely high uric acid levels, severe dehydration, pancreatitis, and nephrosis. They also discovered that I had lost 20 lbs.! Later in the hospital, I would lose 20 more. I remained in excruciating pain for three weeks while multiple branches of the hospital were trying to find out what was wrong with me.

Joshua

My name is Joshua. I was born and raised in South Florida and moved to Oregon after high school 8 years ago. I can’t say that I had a difficult childhood growing up just difficult circumstances that were challenges to overcome. I am what most people would consider an introverted type of personality, and while I was raised in a home with very caring parents and sisters, I’ve just always found it difficult to fit in, especially once I got to high school. I’m tall, at almost 6 feet, and very smart, always in advanced placement classes.

Watch and Wait

Watch and wait (also called active surveillance) involves closely monitoring a patient's condition without giving any treatment until symptoms appear or change. Some people can manage their blood cancer — depending on the disease — with their doctors for years using a watch-and-wait approach. It is usually recommended for patients in early stages of indolent (slow-growing) or chronic forms of blood cancers.

Diagnosis

While certain signs and symptoms may indicate that a person has ET, a series of tests are needed to confirm the diagnosis. It is important to have an accurate diagnosis, as it helps the doctor to: 

• Estimate how the disease will progress
• Determine the appropriate treatment

Some of these tests may be repeated both during and after treatment to evaluate its effectiveness.

Mara

I was in my second to last year of nursing school and just over one year into my marriage when the headaches became too much to bear. I was 21. I was tired all of the time, but I was working in a busy ER and going to class when I wasn't at work. I had lost some weight, but I had been exercising more and getting a lot while working in the ER. I had a cough, but they tell you that you'll be sick a lot when you're in nursing school. Unfortunately, I happened to touch my neck one day while studying with classmates for a big exam. There was a lump there that I had never felt before.

Donna

The year 2021 was quite a year for us. It was the year of cancer. No one ever really prepares themselves for the diagnosis of cancer, and when you're told you have it, the emotional roller coaster you are about to embark on cannot ever be fully described in words. The fear, the exhaustion, the financial burden, the feeling of helplessness you experience is completely terrifying. In the year 2021, we started the fight of all fights, the fight to save my husband's life. This is our story of cancer. Our story of love, life, hope, and healing.

Peter

My story starts a year and a half before diagnosis when a serious body surfing accident led to blood tests showing significantly low red and platelet counts. My primary care physician (PCP) retested several times in a short period, and when the counts came back closer to normal, she chose to stop her inquiry without scheduling further tests or redoing the same test, say, six months later to see if the lower values were actually correct. There was no discussion of what it would have meant if the lower counts were, in fact, an accurate representation of my blood health.

Disease Complications

As myelofibrosis (MF) progresses, complications may arise:

Signs and Symptoms

Essential thrombocythemia (ET) is often detected during a routine blood test before an individual has any symptoms.

The signs and symptoms of ET are linked to high platelet counts that cause the development of a thrombus (blood clot). The symptoms include:

Polycythemia Vera

• Is one of a related group of blood cancers known as “myeloproliferative neoplasms” (MPNs). Too many red blood cells are made in the bone marrow and, in many cases, the numbers of white blood cells and platelets are also elevated.
• With careful medical supervision, PV can usually be managed effectively for many years.

Emmanuel "Manny"

Our son Emmanuel “Manny,” though born with special needs (Down syndrome), was and is your typical little boy. However, up until the time he turned 18 months old, we had no idea just how “special” he was. See, on July 28th, 2011, Manny was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia (AML), a blood cancer. This news shook our family to its core and would undoubtedly be our greatest test and blessing at the same time. How so? Allow us to share Manny’s amazing journey of strength as he battled the deadly AML. 

Jelien

Jelien started showing signs in early July of 2018. She had bruises and cuts that were taking too long to heal. In November, she kept spiking fevers with no other symptoms, and the doctor suggested giving her Motrin and switching to Tylenol. In December, during her well visit, Jelien’s bloodwork came back with slightly low counts, but her hemoglobin was too low. She was admitted to the hospital for a day for observation, and her counts were recovering. She had a follow-up and was cleared.

Treatment for Indolent NHL Subtypes

Indolent non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) subtypes progress slowly. They make up about 40 percent of all NHL cases in the United States. Indolent subtypes include:

Low Blood Counts

Cancer therapy can lower your blood cell counts and chemotherapy especially can affect rapidly dividing bone marrow cells. This hinders the marrow's ability to supply new cells to the blood during treatment and for some time after. Patients receiving treatment for blood cancer can develop

Sexual Health and Intimacy

These webpages cover a range of sensitive topics related to intercourse, sexual health, intimacy and cancer. Although not always discussed, sexual health and intimacy are an important part of your wellbeing, even after a cancer diagnosis. Please note: If you have experienced any type of sexual trauma, we recommend that you seek support and help from a trusted healthcare professional before reading further.

Immunotherapy

Immunotherapy uses your own immune system to fight cancer. There are several types of immunotherapies, and each works to help the immune system in a different way. Some boost your body’s immune system. Others train your immune system to attack specific cancer cells.

Immunotherapies being used or studied to treat blood cancer include:

Diagnosis

Diagnosing juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia (JMML) usually involves ruling out other similar diseases such as chronic myelomonocytic leukemia and chronic myeloid leukemia, especially if your child is older than 6 years. Doctors commonly use blood tests and bone marrow tests to diagnose JMML.

The tests used to diagnose JMML include:

Sophia

I was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) one month before finishing my freshman year of high school. It was shocking and devastating to me and my whole family. I had to leave school, be hospitalized, and begin intense chemotherapy immediately.

Brianna

"He was the king of positivity" is what Dr. McCarthy at Roswell Park said to me the day after my Dad passed away from complications of GVHD or graft-versus-host disease. My Dad was a leader, someone who was always willing to help others, and always had a smile on his face. Not only was I his co-caregiver throughout his cancer journey, but he was also my caregiver during mine.

Reese

Before we knew the world of childhood leukemia, and long before bone marrow transplant was a part of our vocabulary, we had sweet little identical twin girls, named Reese and Quinn. The twins were born in Chicago on April 10, 2014. Reese and Quinn were healthy babies who grew into healthy toddlers and then their little sister Claire joined our world in 2016. These sisters are the best of friends and the greatest supporters of each other.

Amanda

"He was selfless, unbelievably selfless," said Amanda about her father, Andrew. "He did everything for everybody. He worried enough for our family plus more. And never showed it. He worked extremely hard to provide us with everything we could possibly need." 

Paul

I was first diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) at age 25 and since then I've had two bone marrow transplants and CAR-T. For the past 8 years I have been on and off "healthy" and undergoing or actively recovering from treatment. I talked about some of the things I did during those treatments to help my motivation and morale, but there is a lot about the treatments themselves that were unique to someone like me, a mixed race, young adult with blood cancer.

ALL Subtypes

Doctors classify acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) into subtypes by using various tests. It's important to get an accurate diagnosis since your subtype plays a large part in deciding the type of treatment you'll receive. Depending on your ALL subtype, the doctor will determine