[ejoegrayc]

My grandpa passed today. He has battled MDS for the past year. He was eighty years old. He had consistent low red blood cell counts and had to get transfusions once to twice a week. He started treatment with Vidaza, when that did not work we went to Revlimed. This too did not work. Both medications really took a toll on his body. His appetite decreased, he was constantly nauseous and grew weaker week to week. His quality of life decreased when on these medications, he was unable to do daily life activities as he once had been pretty active at his age. The treatments gave us roller coaster results, one week he would be a little better and have less transfusions a week, the next week he would be extremely weak and go in for two transfusions that week. He spent the last few weeks of his life in the hospital. He got an infection through his port, luckily a nurse caught the infection. They gave him several antibiotics. His body really struggled and weakened from fighting this infection. At this time his kidneys and liver were starting to shut down slowly.

The moral of this story........

If your loved one is older, consider their quality of life. If my family could redo it all, we would have just managed his disease instead of treating it. The drugs really took away his quality of life and could have possibly took him from us sooner. Also, if you are diagnosed with a serious illness take care of your living will, power of attorney and get things in order for your loved ones ahead of time. I will really miss my grandpa, he put up one hell of a fight. Seeing him suffer was one of the hardest experiences in my life and I am glad he is finally at peace.....