By the end of November 2008, I started feeling an overwhelming fatigue. I developed a fever and my physician sent me urgently to the emergency room. There I was found to be depleted of blood and needed a transfusion. It seemed so unreal.
For the past nine years as a physician assistant, I have had the privilege of taking care of acute leukemia, high-risk lymphoma and bone marrow transplant patients at the Intermountain Blood and Marrow Transplant Program.
My blood cancer story started in 1987 when I was diagnosed and treated for testicular cancer with surgery and chemotherapy. As I progressed to the end of the chemo regimen, my blood counts would not return to normal. A bone marrow biopsy showed that I had developed treatment-related acute myeloid leukemia (AML) as a result of the chemotherapy for the testicular cancer.
My father, Alan Schwall, was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia (AML) at the very start of my sophomore year in college -- in the fall of 2006 when he was only 51 years old. He always had knee issues, but the summer between my freshman and sophomore year at college, he developed a swollen leg/knee and other problems that made it hard for him to walk at times.
Zach Guillot was a normal, healthy, superhero-loving kid when he was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) at age five.
In 1989, Marc Smith, was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia (AML). He was given a terminal prognosis and for more than two years endured numerous obstacles and setbacks, including two relapses and six extensive rounds of chemotherapy. His only chance of even short-term survival was to have a bone marrow transplant.
Kaidyn was only six months old when he was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia (AML). About two months later, he received a bone marrow aspiration and was started on chemotherapy. Over the next ten months, Kaidyn was in and out of Children's Hospital of Oakland. It was there that he took his first steps, said his first words, and even flirted with every nurse in the oncology unit!
Hi, my name is Carley and I am an angel. I was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) in 1995 and I died in 1996. I was 3 ½ years old when I died and I tried so hard to live, but AML was just so terrible and there weren’t a lot treatments back then. My parents were so sad when I went to heaven.
Hi, my name is Carley and I am an angel. I was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) in 1995 and I died in 1996. I was 3 ½ years old when I died and I tried so hard to live, but AML was just so terrible and there weren’t a lot treatments back then. My parents were so sad when I went to heaven.