Newly diagnosed 2 1/2 yr old daughter

Hello all. My daughter is the love of my life. Her name is Kennadie. She was diagnosed Monday with ITP. it all started about 2 months ago. My daughter stayed sick during the winter months, she caught A LOT from her daycare but anyways, she has a cold, RSV, the flu, ear infection all witin 2-3 months. She was literally sick every other week. Well one Saturday about 3 months ago, we took her to the doctor bc of a 103 fever, they oddly ck'ed her platelets and they were around 50,000, we then went back 3-4 days later for a 2nd ck and they had dropped to 30,000. The doctor wanted us to wait 5 days and have them drawn again because he said it was due her having so many viral infections that it suppressed her immune system, causing her platelets to be low. so we back and they were UP to 200,000 then another week later, up to 300,000, all by themselves. She hasn't been sick since. Well yesterday i noticed the patekie sp? under her neck me being as scared as i am, i took her to have her CBC ck'ed and to my surprise (which i had a gut feeling) her platelets had dropped to 105,000. I am worried SICk, i am so scared of leukemia. Her WBC,RBC and hemoglobin have always stayed good. Nothing ever has been wrong with them, just her platelets. We go Thursday to a hematologist for further testing, im guessing. i am so scared my babygirl is sick i just need some insight.

Whitt:

I've been on this Forum since 1998 and have never seen a case of leukemia due to low platelets. Try not to worry about that; if the rest of her CBC is good, then it sounds platelet related.

Many children have acute ITP due to an illness. It probably happens more often than anyone knows, because most doctors don't check platelets when a child is sick. You just happened to catch it. Kennadie has had great counts for the most part, even the 30,000 is not dangerously low. The fact that they went up on their own so quickly is a very good sign. I don't know why they dropped recently to 105, but it could be that she is still recovering and her counts are going up and down. That can happen. 105 is still a great count and it's odd that she'd even have petechiae at that count.

Good luck with the hematologist. I'm betting he will just monitor her for a while and she'll be just fine! If she does keep dropping and needs treatment, you know where to find us for questions and reassurance!

Thank you so much Sandi for your information. My husband says i over react about everything but this really does scare me to death. I hope everything will turn out good tomorrow. Please say a prayer for her and me lol. Thank you agani for all the info you took the time to give me

Let me know how it goes! I hope you get peace of mind.

We can never overreact when it comes to our kids!

My son was diagnosed at 18 months and it was the same sort of thing. He was sick all Winter and my sister who is a nurse noticed the Petechia and excessive bruising so I took him in to be checked and right away we too panicked he had Lukemia and honestly his Hematologist was worried about that as well since ITP blood work can look like Lukemia on paper. They did a bone marrow test on my son within days of finding out about the low platelets and it came back as ITP that was 5 years ago and that has been the worst he ever was he's great now and you would never know he has anything. We take him to the Hematologist for blood work once a year just to check in but otherwise we don't do anything. He's never had any medications or treatments ever. His lowest we know of was 52 and his highest was 133 last July at his last Hemo appointment.

Like Sandi said a lot of kids and adults have low platelets but they never know, we were told we most likely wouldn't have known if I wasn't a mom who pushes blood work, a lot of people never have their child blood tested so how would they know right? My husband has ITP as well and we didn't know until my son was diagnosed, he's 36 and didn't even know and he's never ever sick actually I get sick far more than he does LOL! Your daughter's case sounds a lot like my son, I bet they just end up observing her closely and when she levels out they will put more time between your visits like they did with us, they will probably check her clotting factors too. My son and husband have normal clotting factors so they never have bleeding issues. If you have ITP and it's less than 6 months there is still a huge chance it will go away on it's own and was just from being sick.

Good luck!
Shelley

Thank you both so much for all the info. We went to her apt Thursday and everything was good except for her platelets, which were 86,000. He said they were going to draw her blood every two weeks, for 6 months & hopefully it will go away on its on without any meds. BUT i am taking her back tomorrow because she has broke out in even more patekie (sp?) and im worried. I called the doctor & they recommend we bring her in have her blood drawn.