Important Info!

I completely forgot to mention something important my doctor and I discussed. Several weeks ago my specialty pharmacy called me and told me that recent studies showed Vivaglobin was absorbed faster with fewer reactions if you used the same site all the time. When I showed my therapy journal to my doctor he noted that I was always doing it in my legs and I told him what the pharmacy nurse had told me. Instead of being interested, as I usually am with new research the seems helpful – he instead asked “did you ever stop to think about why it might be more permeable?” And went on to explain that by using the same site all the time I run the risk of permanent tissue damage, look up the word “necrotic” I’m not going to describe it here – and the breakdown of cells and tissues could explain why it’s more permeable when you use the same site all the time. 😮 TOTALLY MAKES SENSE – and that’s why he gets paid the big bucks. I was typically getting no reaction out of my legs but when we did my arms on Friday – they got a skin reaction – ten times more than I’ve ever seen in my legs. I’m going to take that as a good sign even though they were sore a day later. SO for now we are going to alternate arms and legs, we never got training on using my back but I think we might need to do that now. I’m still reluctant to use my abdomen for fear of causing that horrible pain/inflammation/spasm thing again.

Oh and one more important thing to make you smile – IVIg caused me to gain more than 40 lbs. When I switched from monthly to weekly IVIg I lost 10 of those, when I switched to Vivaglobin I lost another 20 lbs. I think the remaining 5-10 lbs. are really fat, the junk food kind, and not due to the Ig but still – pretty cool huh? 20 lbs in 5 weeks is snappy!!! and now I don’t have to buy new clothes! I’m not really a vain person but I’ve always been conscious of my weight if for no other reason than fear of more slipped discs… bad backs run in my family and I have seen first hand how being over-weight exacerbates the problem. I’ve been fretting over the weight-gain while at the same time trying not to beat myself up too much for things I can’t control. Now I only have to worry about my intake and that’s just up to me to monitor what goes in my mouth. 😀 And it sure is much easier to get around not carrying around that extra weight – perhaps this is the real reason my legs are not shaking as much.