Delayed

The CART-19 study has been put on hold because a participant died on Sunday.  This was the first death in the 75 people in the UPenn study so far. The physician leading this trial said that he doesn't have enough data from the deaths reported at the Sloan Ketttering CART trial to know of similarities, and he said not all data on the Penn death are yet available. Until he and the study monitors feel confident of their procedures and protocols, the study is not signing up new patients. This delay is not expected to last longer than a week or two but may be resolved in a few days.

That is the bad news. The good news is that Chris looks like a viable participant so far. Also, they are going to take care of him through platelet transfusion tomorrow and by starting him on a drug to control the leukemia cell production (allopurinol).

Olivia came with us today. She was a HUGE help and comfort. She drove us over and dropped us, parked, went to all the appointments, asked great questions informed by her years of work in clinical trials, and then drove us to an iconic Philly hoagie shop.  Not to mention putting us up and cheering Chris with her presence and attention. I am so grateful to her.

I don't know what we will do about the flights booked for Friday.  This is a relatively trivial concern at this point.  Superstitiously, I didn't buy flight insurance, thinking that it might jinx us. I may have misunderstood the way that jinx works: it's when you buy the insurance that there is no need for it.