[Lisa V]

Bill, I just want to add my voice to the others who say 2 months is too soon to make a decision. ATG can take several months to kick in, and progress may be excruciatingly slow after that. There's no point in going through another, possibly unnecessary procedure until you're sure it's not working. It took my husband nearly 3 months to see an initial response, and several years for his platelets to finally creep back up to normal range. As long as counts seem to be moving in the right direction more often than not, that's a successful outcome.

Ryan has made several good points-- first, that there are a number of factors (age, quality of available match, other health issues, etc.) to consider in making such a decision. Second, that if ATG was rough, a BMT is likely to be ten times as rough (especially with an unrelated donor, even a perfectly matched one). It is a BIG DEAL with a whole slew of potential complications and a long recovery period. Not something to be taken lightly, and certainly not something to be entered into as a way of avoiding ATG, since that plus chemotherapy are usually a part of the procedure.

I'm not trying to scare you or talk you or your brother out of going that route if circumstances seem to favor it, just hoping that you will use this time to get a realistic picture of some of the issues involved, so that if and when the time comes, Jeff and his doctor can make an informed decision together.