Chemical Warfare Update: Day 8

Today marked the end of the first week of Bailey's chemo. We thought we were lucky and had made it through unscathed, but a late developing infection in her ear proved otherwise and has officially been blamed on the chemo. 

She spent the day at the vet to get treatment #2, but her CBC (Complete Blood Count) test showed she wasn't quite ready for it. Her white blood cell count was 4.6 (6.0 is low normal). He said that's not terrible, but specifically her neutrophil count (which is a type of white blood cell) was below 3000, which is the level they want it to be at or above before each dose of vinblastin. Hers was 2900, but he said if he gave her the treatment anyway, then next week could be even worse and (more) side effects could show up. 

So, we held off. She is still on antibiotics, got her ear all cleaned up and is on hold until Dec. 1 where we'll try again. If her ear doesn't look better by Monday, I'll have to take her back in, but otherwise, we get a reprieve from the vet's office for an entire week...something we haven't done in more than a month! Lucky us...