Low White Blood Count: What does this mean for chemotherapy?

Posted by pghsusan @pghsusan, Apr 25, 2023

I posted a few weeks ago about my Dad...he is about 26 months into treatment.

He had labs taken 2 hours ago & they already called to say he has low white blood cell count. (they have never called after labs before).

Have to take his temperature twice a day & if over 101 to call them asap.

Worried that this may mean no chemo on Thursday and also worried that maybe they will say nothing further they can do....but i don't want to jump to conclusions.

Anyone have experience with this issue? How was the outcome?

Interested in more discussions like this? Go to the Esophageal Cancer Support Group.

Yes, I had low white blood cell count during early chemo treatments for esophageal cancer tumor, and they had to delay the next treatment a few weeks until the count was back up to minimum required.

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In the early stages of treatment I had the same problem - blood count was too low and had to bump treatments till it came up to the minimum (1.5). They changed treatment schedule to every 3 weeks instead of 2 weeks and it had been good for the past year. And then suddenly this week it was too low. The only difference is that up to this week is that I have taken dexamethasone a day or two before the blood test - except for this week. So maybe that’s what has bumped my blood count up till this week. I’ve saved some of those pills instead of taking all of them after a chemo treatment. I’m thinking that’s what may have worked for me.

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