Lauren is up at CHLA to meet with Dr. Finlay and to restart her chemo, which is a big relief since she has been off it for so long. Dr. Finlay has narrowed the cause of Lauren's pancreatitis last month from the chemo, Irinotecan, to either the chemo, Avastin or her monthly Pantamidine, to help prevent pneumonia. So basically, they still have no idea of the cause and I'm not sure we'll ever really know what that exact cause was.

A big surprise was that we found out today that Lauren's enzyme levels from our last visit with Dr. Finlay (during Lauren last MRI two weeks ago), were over 1,000, meaning they were elevated (they should be below 100). This really has us concerned. That pancreatitis is really awful, since there is no medication for it, and the treatment is no food or water, meaning she'll have to stay in the hospital until she gets better. This was also a surprise because she hasn't complained of any pains since we got out of the hospital even though she did complain today that her side hurt, but she was also upset because she didn't want to go to the hospital today, she wanted to go to school.

Since they don't really know the cause, they are just going to administer the chemo, Irinotecan and Temodar today, and administer her Pantamidine via an inhalant vs. IV. As I mentioned in my prior blog entries, I hope Lauren's pancreatitis isn't due to either of the chemos, Irinotecan or Avastin, since this combination has had good results in other cases. Since a kid in her class had a fever and was sent home yesterday, Lauren is going to get a shot of Tamiflu as a precaution. Just hearing all my co-works hacking and sniffling away, I have no idea how she'll be able to stay away from all the germs in a kindergarten class. I did donate a big bottle of hand sanitizer to her class, I figured it couldn't hurt.