The Twelve Days of Chemo

I have managed to survive the first several days of chemo. But contrary to the title of this post, my treatments will last a lot longer than twelve days.

The first five days were spent as a resident of Swedish Hospital's Oncology Unit, one of the nicer departments of the hospital, in my limited experience. Most of chemo consists of being tethered to an IV tower with pumps that beep annoyingly at the slightest problem. Ah where is the intelligent robotic designs of modern medicine promised by Gene Roddenberry and George Lucas?

I'm out of the hospital now, but here are some lyrical impressions of my first few days of my hospital treatment — with apologies to medical inaccuracies and to the staff, most of whom have been wonderful.

On the 12 days of chemo my RN gave to me:

12 blood draws
11 electrolytes
10 Bleomycin
9 units Etoposide
8 shots Cisplatin
7 parts potassium
6 doses Zofran
5 Decadron
4 Atavan
3 CAT scans
2 ultrasounds
And some saline through an IV.