Blood count drop

[Teddy405]

Was diagnosed last July with CLL. Blood count went from 14000 to 19000 this past December. Today had another blood test and it dropped to 15000 Wow Wow! Not sure why, but I have been taking tumaric since September. Maybe it helped, but not sure.

[Cllcanada Top Poster CURE Hero]

White blood cell count [WBC] can bounce around for a multitude of reasons other than CLL.

Under 30K doctors don't get too excited about it test to test, but over that figure they look for trends over perhaps a year to get an idea of the rate of CLL progression.

When the absolute lymphocyte count [ALC] doubles in under 6 months, it is an indication for treatment talks and then other factors are brought into the discussion.

You might find this Patient Guideline useful it goes over all this in some detail...

nccn.org/patients/guideline...

~chris

[Jm954 Administrator]

Sounds lovely and stable overall, enjoy!

[LuvUtah]

I was diagnosed last July too. Went from 27000 to 32000 in 3 months, but up only .06 on my last draw.

I take turmeric and a green tea supplement daily..... figured it can't hurt.

Congrats on your new number!

[AussieNeil Partner Administrator in reply to LuvUtah]

Welcome to our community LuvUtah,

If you are taking turmeric and a green tea supplements, you should take them alternate days, not together, based on the limited research (in vitro) that showed that the two supplements taken together were less effective than when alternated. I take green tea during week days and turmeric on the weekend for that reason.

Turmeric and Green Tea: A Recipe for the Treatment of B-CLL

clincancerres.aacrjournals....

Incidentally, I don't understand what you mean by up by only 0.06 on your last draw, but I suspect you mean that the lymphocyte percentage of your white blood cells went up by 6% (0.06)? If so, just ignore percentages (because that figure is changed by changes in other white blood cell counts) and just look at how much change there has been from 32,000. Incidentally the change from 27,000 to 32,000 over 3 months shouldn't concern you - it could be within normal variation. Now that you have finally exceeded the 30,000 (30k) figure after which CLL specialists begin to look at doubling times (as Cllcanada mentioned above), you should monitor your trend. A doubling time of under 6 months along with another indication you are approaching the need for treatment, could be a trigger for starting treatment, but given we have members with counts 10 times higher than yours still in watch and wait, I wouldn't be concerned at your counts.

Neil

[vinnet]

I am 65, in India, and diagnosed CLL.

How to get green tea and turmeric supplements? How much be taken?

Any advise on life expectency without any treatment. At my age I wish to avoid chemo . Oral medicines cannot be afforded by me. I want to slow cll progression by supplements and yoga...

[AussieNeil Partner Administrator in reply to vinnet]

Here are some previous discussions on green tea and turmeric:

healthunlocked.com/cllsuppo...

healthunlocked.com/cllsuppo...

Any life expectancy figures you find in Internet searches are well out of date and understate what's now possible. The latest figures I know of showing a slight improvement - despite not including the improvement available with FCR treatment - even a likely cure if you have the right CLL genetics and that's a chemoimmunotherapy treatment which has been available for over 10 years. It will be about 10 years before we see what impact non-chemo treatments have on life expectancy.

Neil