Search Results
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.
Ed
Like many who get diagnosed with multiple myeloma (MM), it comes out of nowhere. For me, it was mysterious aches and pains that crept up quickly. An alert doctor ordered tests, and eventually, MGUS, the precursor of MM, was first diagnosed. Within a month, MM was confirmed. MM is a blood/bone cancer that can affect the entire body.
For the next six months, I was involved in many tests, along with drug treatments including chemo. I had a stem cell transplant and have generally had a complete response.
Treatment
It's important that your doctor is experienced in treating patients with hairy cell leukemia or works in consultation with a hairy cell leukemia specialist. This type of specialist is usually called a hematologist oncologist.
Types of Hairy Cell Leukemia TreatmentFor many people with hairy cell leukemia, starting treatment helps them focus on moving ahead and looking forward to their disease's remission.
Several types of approaches and treatment are used for adults with hairy cell leukemia, some at different stages:
Chemotherapy
Because of acute lymphoblastic leukemia's (ALL's) rapid growth, most patients need to start chemotherapy soon after diagnosis.
Chemotherapy drugs kill fast-growing cells throughout the body including cancer cells and normal, healthy cells. The damage to normal, healthy cells can cause side effects. Yet, not everyone experiences side effects the same way.
ALL treatment consists of:
Stem Cell Transplantation with High-Dose Chemotherapy
High-dose chemotherapy and stem cell transplantation are important parts of treatment plans for eligible, recently diagnosed myeloma patients. One of the following types of transplants may be used:
Yarnall Family
To be of service to others comes naturally to the Yarnalls. Bob is a 25-year Marine Corps veteran and a teacher. Kim is a chiropractor for over 22 years.
Cayden
Cayden was only three years old when he was diagnosed with Philadelphia chromosome-positive acute lymphoblastic leukemia (Ph+ ALL) in April 2020. Before his diagnosis, Cayden was full of energy, and he loved to eat. But then he started to complain about leg pain. We first thought it was just a growth spurt, but the pain got so bad that he could not walk. He also lost his appetite. That wasn’t like him at all, and I knew something was not right. It was the height of COVID-19, but we took him to the emergency room. All of his tests came back negative.
Treatment
It's important that your doctor is experienced in treating patients with acute leukemia or has access to an acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) specialist.
Types of ALL TreatmentDoctors use several types of approaches and treatment combinations for ALL:
Healthy Eating
People living with cancer may have different nutrition goals and challenges, depending on their:
Therapy Acceleration Program - Portfolio
Since 2017, three TAP-supported therapies have been approved by the U.S.Finances and Insurance Coverage
Healthcare costs are a key concern for most people with blood cancer. Many patients don't have health insurance, and for others, coverage is limited. If you have health insurance, it's essential that you know what your plan covers and how to maintain your benefits.
Where to Start
You and your family will need to decide how to pay for treatment while managing household finances. You probably also need to consider additional indirect costs, such as lost time from work, childcare and travel expenses.
Side Effects
The main goal of treatment for myeloma is to get rid of myeloma cells. The term side effect is used to describe how treatment affects healthy cells. Patients react to treatments in different ways. Sometimes there are very mild side effects. Other side effects may be serious and last a long time.
Myeloma patients should talk with their doctors about side effects before they begin any type of treatment. There are drugs and other therapies can prevent or manage many side effects.
Isabelle
I was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) on December 4, 2003, at the age of five. As a young child, I was very energetic and loved to do anything outdoors and active, and I especially loved a good competition with my older brother Harrison. My parents began noticing that something was off when I started complaining about not being able to walk up the big hills in San Francisco where we lived. This was very uncharacteristic of me as I loved to race my brother to the top.
Blastic Plasmacytoid Dendritic Cell Neoplasm
For personalized disease and treatment information, or to learn about clinical trials, contact one of The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's (LLS's) Information Specialists at (800) 955-4572. BackgroundBlastic plasmacytoid dendritic cell neoplasm (BPDCN) was previously known as natural killer (NK) cell leukemia/lymphoma. As understanding of the biology and origin of this malignancy has improved, the World Health Organization (WHO) established the term blastic plasmacytoid dendritic cell neoplasm (BPDCN) in 2008.
Treatment of Acute Promyelocytic Leukemia
Acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL) is a unique subtype of acute myeloid leukemia (AML). APL cells have a very specific abnormality that involves chromosomes 15 and 17, leading to the formation of an abnormal fusion gene called PML/RARα. This mutated gene causes many of the features of the disease. APL accounts for about 10-15 percent of all adult AML cases diagnosed each year.
Julia
Julia is an eleven-year-old volleyball player, and when she started to experience digestive issues that we couldn't equate to anything, we were afraid that her physical symptoms would keep her off the court for a prolonged period of time.
Sarah
I was diagnosed with B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (B-cell ALL) in October 2020 at the age of 38. It was a shocking diagnosis. I started feeling bad in September with extreme fatigue and some body aches, nothing terribly alarming. I'm a busy wife and mom of two young kids (ages 2 and 8 at the time of diagnosis) with a full-time job and two new puppies. I figured I was just worn out from everything. I had routine bloodwork scheduled for my annual physical. When my primary care doctor received the results, he called and asked me to go to the emergency room.
Josh
I was 38 years old; my three-year-old daughter was turning four in one month. My wife and I just found out that we were expecting a new little one in eight months. I had been feeling weak, tired, and just like I had had a sickness that wouldn't go away for about four weeks. I just kept pushing through and going to work without giving it much thought, and I even went to the ski hill for a snowboarding day trip. I had gone into a few different walk-in clinics at that time, and they had told me I was young, and all viral tests were clear.
Alan
Life is unpredictable. It can throw unexpected challenges at us, testing our strength, resilience, and hope. My story began in November 2020 with a dreaded phone call from my doctor’s office. The results of my bone marrow biopsy were in, and I had acute myeloid leukemia (AML). AML is a fast-growing and life-threatening cancer of the blood and bone marrow. It was so serious that I needed to get myself to the emergency room right away.
Signs and Symptoms
A person who has signs or symptoms that suggest the possibility of non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) is usually referred to a blood cancer specialist called a hematologist-oncologist. The doctor will order additional tests and a tissue biopsy to make a diagnosis. The signs and symptoms of NHL are also associated with a number of other, less serious diseases.
The most common early sign of NHL is painless swelling of one or more lymph node(s).
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.
Brandi
My concerns began to rise when I noticed some spotting/bleeding between cycles that would last for 10 minutes or less. Additionally, I also started to experience slight abdominal cramps first thing in the morning. I’ve always been a deep sleeper and rarely woke up in the middle of the night to use the restroom, so nothing seemed out of the ordinary. That escalated to me waking up multiple times in the middle of the night to try to use the restroom, sometimes without cramps and other times with extreme abdominal cramps.
Adam
My wife left me after 33½ years of marriage (37½ including dating) and 2½ years into my remission. I read stories about a spouse, usually a male for some reason, who up and left his partner either during active treatment or when everything looked like the patient, the person, would live, but I never thought any of that would happen to me, and it sure as heck did. She fell out of love with me, with caring for me, with helping me. I may have been an ass, but I wasn't an asshole ― you know what I mean? She probably feels she didn't deserve any of this either, but . . .
Mark
My wife, Linda, and I celebrate and lament our first anniversary; I was diagnosed with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) on June 5, 2023. While death is not impending, our future has radically changed. There are losses, namely a more predictable and imaginable future. Certain certainties are broken that cannot be fixed. We search for new norms that require reimagining hopes, dreams, and aspirations. Of course, we will not give up on illness-specific hope that remission comes sooner than later and that side effects subside. No proof exists that we will get what we hope for.