Post-Chemo Low White Blood Cell Count people around?

nooyijey

Hello,

I finished my last chemo back in May 2019, and I'll be having my last Herceptin+Perjeta infusion on Christmas Eve!

However, since my last chemo, my White Blood Cell (WBC) count has been on the decline and staying low which is making my life pretty rough battling infections. I'm looking for people who may be dealing with/dealt with this same issue for some help.

Stay Strong!

MinusTwo

My white count dropped a couple of times. My MO had me on Neulasta shots 24 hours after chemo. That worked every time but one. They talked about a transfusion, but it was Thanksgiving weekend and I refused to go to the hospital when all the regulars were on holiday. Gradually it got better but it took most of a year. I was careful to stay away from germs.

moth

You're not alone! I had super low counts throughout chemo, got hospitalized twice for febrile neutropenia and was on all the varations of grastofil, neupogen & neulasta all to no avail. Chemo was a real struggle for me with delays and dose reductions and all sorts of contortions to just get me to finish chemo.

My counts for months after chemo have been all over the place. Chemo ended in July 2018. In March 2019 I finally crawled into low normal ranges, but in April I was low again. And then my doctors decided to stop testing it. Because I'm not symptomatic and I did hit normal counts at least once, they figure my bone marrow is obviously not permanently damaged so they feel it's best to just leave this alone and stop stressing about it. They told me they'd be worried if my red blood cells didn't recover (which it did), but the WBC being low'ish was not really worrying them.

I do wash my hands and sanitizing hand rub a lot but that's about it.

I got my flu shot plus updated some other vaccines after consulting with public health. I would recommend that.