Recently diagnosed

Matthew- good to hear you've gotten a second opinion and may be switching doctors!

Some of the things your first doctor has been saying are rather strange, not sure where hes getting his information- like "doing NPlate before splenectomy lessens the chance removing the spleen will be successful" ??! never heard that before!

Starting NPlate without knowing if Rituxin will work might not be as confusing as it seems. You could start off with a low dose of Nplate that just brings your numbers up to the teens or 20s. Then when the Rituxin kicks in you'll know by a jump in your numbers. Then taper off NPlate.

NPlate is a very adjustable drug. The lowest dose is 1mcg per kilo of body weight, it goes up to 10mcg per kilo of body weight. It allows room to play around with the dosing. good luck!

I appreciate everyone responding/weighing in. I am feeling good about changing hematologists. Waiting for the new doctor to get back with an appointment. She's chief of hematology & oncology at a teaching hospital. When I called Friday to set a follow up appointment, they told me four weeks. That won't work, obviously. But they were the hospital's General schedulers - I need to find a way to get more direct access to the doctor, especially at the beginning of working with her AND starting a new treatment. We shall see how it goes the next couple days.

I was recently diagnosed with ITP this past July I was scheduled for a surgery and was having my presurgery testing and my blood work came back with a platelet count of 12k. They sent me to have it rechecked the next day and it was at 8k. I was so and still am ignorant of what platelet count was I couldn't understand why they were making a big deal over it. I started to get scared when the doctor they sent me to was an oncologist and naturally thought the worse and still do. I been reading a lot of posts and am finally coming to realize that I can have ITP and it doesn't mean I have leukemia or something. My doctor had me on 60mg of prednisone for 6 weeks and it did no good, my count never got above 30k. Now he has been using Nplate for 4 weeks and it has went up to 63k then dropped to 32k. My biggest issue is how bad I feel for 3 days after the injection. I have trouble breathing and my chest hurts. I also get migraines but those i can live with. It's the feeling of having a heart attack that worries me. Is this common? I have a million questions but don't want to sound ignorant. Although on this subject I am. Anyone that can help me with answers would be greatly appreciated. Sorry I was all over the place with this post, I was kind of blindsided by all this because I've always been healthy. The surgery I was going to have was for a torn ACL in my knee. Thank you in advance for any help.

Ice:

You should start a new thread, that way, you'll get the answers and attention that you need. Any count above 30k is considered a safe count, so as long as you are over that, you should be fine. Also, symptoms play a big part and if you have no bleeding or serious bruising, that is a good sign that your body can handle the lower counts.

I don't know about the N-Plate side effects, but others do. I do know that many times, they go away after a few weeks.

Matthews:

Sounds good! Good luck getting in with the doctor.