How do you know if it gotten worse

[pleasant1911]

My father, who is battling MDS, has lost a lot of weigh and he just look weak and frail, and skin color is all different....well he just looks different from the past couple months ago.

How can you tell if his MDS is getting worse, and what are the signs from becoming a low risk to mid risk to high risk. Does anybody have person experience with it.

He is on revlimid and vidaza, and transfusions

[Birgitta-A]

Hi pleasant 1911!
This info from Marrowforums is showing how we can tell the differences between low, interm-1, interm-2 and high risk MDS.
http://www.marrowforums.org/mds.html

As you can see we need to know the blast count in the bone marrow, cytogenetics and number of cytopenias (Hgb, WBC and platelets).

For example I have less than 5% blast cells in my bone marrow = 0.
I have chromosome aberrations -12p and -X = 0.5.
Low HGB and platelets at dx (now low WBC too) = 0.5
This means that I have

[Birgitta-A]

Sorry - I sent the post too early.

This means that I have 1.0 points = Interm- 1
Kind regards
Birgitta-A

[bebop]

blood tests should tell alot. I watched my dad grow weaker it seemed like every day.