[billyb]

Hello and welcome, you could be correct, going on treatment now could be a more aggressive classification but it could also mean you doctors feel by getting a jump on it they feel they can get it under control, its hard to say because you havent given a lot of info, I just assume your dad is going on vidaza because of his age or health. Some things that might help you about treatment are that going on a 6 treatment cycle will give the doctors an idea if treatment is working. Your father could experience a lot of different things, everybody is different, treatment lowers blood levels ( red, white, platelets, neutrifils, ect. ) blood levels are importent for bodely function, usually at about 3 months your father should be at his low and then hopefully they should start to rise, like I said everybody is different he could drop levels after 1 treatment, its important to keep track of your reports, more than likely they will pull blood one a week or one a month, so any way, with low white bolld counts you can get infections so be aware of your surroundings, wash hands and stuff like that, low platelets can bring on things like brusing, nose bleeds and sometimes in severe cases internal bleeding, they can treat low red counts and low platelet counts with transfissions and give meds for pain, most of the time when leukemia patients are going thru treatment they have bone pain and nausea, do yourself a favor and dont focus on statical data on life expendency, put your energy into possitive things, treatment time can be stressful at times, but ya'll can handle this, this site is very informitive and has loving and careing people on here that have been or are exactly where you are at, keep us updated, we are here to help, YOU ARE NOT ALONE.....Billy