Saturday, March 12, 2016

Anti-Rejection Meds and Daylight Saving Time

Daylight Saving Time, I do believe Arizona has it right.

With the exception of our coffee pot, pretty much all of our clocks shift automatically for DST, so no worries about being late to anything tomorrow, but it is still a bit of a pain in the rear.

The first few months post-transplant are spent getting lots and lots of lab work done.  The Transplant Team is shooting for a specific concentration of one anti-rejection medication, and a very specific blood chemistry to ensure that the immune system is properly suppressed by the other.  This helps ensure the body does not reject the new lungs.  For lung transplant recipients, this is a lifelong  balance.  My body will never accept my new lungs without the help of my anti-rejection meds.  I take my anti-rejection medications at 9:00 AM and 9:00 PM.  It is important that the meds be taken as close to 12 hours apart as possible.  Labs to check medication levels and immune system function are taken at 8:00 in the morning, 11 hours after the last dose.  Being off by an hour in either taking the medications or getting the labs will give the Team faulty data.  It is important to stay on schedule.

Right now my blood chemistry and medication dose is all out of whack due to the infection that had me in the ICU recently.  My immune system ended up way too suppressed and allowed a simple infection to just go wild.  I guess I should write a post about that episode soon.  Well anyway, the team gave me meds to help my body produce white blood cells and they reduced my anti-rejection drugs.  The lower dose of both of my main anti-rejection meds is kind of scary.  Another med that keeps me from catching a virus that came with the new lungs has also been reduced.

My next visit with the Team is Tuesday morning.  When the time changes I adjust my med schedule a bit each day until I'm at the new 9 and 9.  Tomorrow's morning dose will be at 9:15 then I'll be back on schedule tomorrow evening and everything should be balanced by my labs on Tuesday morning.

The rest of my meds are not nearly so time sensitive so shifting an hour here or there does not have much of an effect on my day.

2 comments:

  1. Interesting about that med being so super sensitive. Certainly hope it comes out right where they want it. NM

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  2. I'll have to study up and pay attention to all your info on gut bugs.

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