new to aa

[lillianr]

feeling very new to aa,just about to have atg treatment been told because of my age (65)it may not work ,has anybody my age had atg.

[Margaret W]

Welcome, lillianr. I'm sorry you've been diagnosed with this... It was 44 years ago today that I was diagnosed with AA, and I'm a year older than you.

I had equine ATG at age 37 in 1987, but it never really kicked in and so I'm considered an "ATG failure." Now they want to do rabbit ATG on me because I'm back in the "severe AA" range, but... We'll see.

I've never heard that one's age would undermine the effects of either type of ATG... And I've been evaluated by the folks at the NIH, Johns Hopkins, the Cleveland Clinic and now I've gone back to the University of Michigan, which is where I started out back in 1972.

Maybe someone else here has been through ATG for the first time at our age... Best wishes to you, and prayers for your course of treatment and recovery.

Margaret

[Hopeful]

Hi lillian,

Try to remain positive through your treatment and recovery. As with all of these treatments, there is a chance that they won't work, but there is also a chance that they will.

I think that the issue with aging is that it takes longer for everything to heal! The bone marrow is probably no exception. So be patient after the treatment. The immune attack will have been thwarted, but your marrow will be extremely fragile and it will take time to rebuild. Take every extra precaution to prevent infections during this time.

Best of luck!

[Tripleal]

Good luck with the atg I'm 65 now was 64 when I had it,my specialist said it works on about 3 out of every 5 people unfortunately I wasn't one of the 3 . since had unrelated bmt 15 months ago , and at the present time I'm doing well. so stay positive . God is good

[vickij]

I had horse ATG for AA when I was 58. it helped for about a year before I was told that I had MDS. I had a bone marrow transplant 3 1/2 years ago at age 60. I was told that as long as I was healthy age wasn't an issue. I have been doing good with just a few bumps along the way. Good luck to you.