Arthor Finn Fights Leukemia

❤️ UPDATE 6/28/23

Just living in the hospital still.

Arthur’s counts are looking like they are finally on the rise! We have 4 solid days of platelet growth, white blood cell growth, and neutrophil growth, and electrolytes are holding steady even as we reduce input.

Still have a long way to go. (Trying to name the walls long) but we are finding moments of joy, and facing challenges together.

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Lars and Echo are currently spending day and night at the Kapiolani Children’s Hospital after life-flighting their 20 week-old baby, Arthor Finn from Hilo Hospital on Friday afternoon after he had exhibited some strange symptoms prior to a routine check up. Lars was able to send me this brief description of the last few days…

We went in on Thursday for standard pediatric visit, but he was fussy and had minor facial paralysis (just happened to be right before his 4 month check up, we thought we were just going in for vaccines) we had noticed the weird face stuff so rescheduled the vaccines but kept the appointment for a check up. They ordered a cbc and his white blood cell count was 105,000 (we found out at like 7 or 8...) we got the call about the blood work, went down to the emergency that night, they had him on iv fluids all night doing constant (4 hour) blood draws. But he has tiny veins and our poor er nurses don't work in a pediatric hospital so they had trouble hiting them with the needles. Echo and Arthor got life flighted over Friday at noon, then I followed on Hawaiian Airlines.

He has infant b cell ALL is the diagnosis. I'm in the Ronald Mcdonald house, Echo has been living in the hospital. We are going to be here for at least another month for the first stage of treatment.

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Infant B Cell ALL

Infant Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia

What is infant ALL?

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is a cancer of the blood and bone marrow. ALL is the most common form of childhood cancer.

Infant ALL occurs in children ages 1 year and younger. ALL in infants is rare. About 90 cases occur each year in the United States.

Infant ALL is different from ALL in older children. Treating cancer in infants is a challenge. Infant ALL is usually aggressive.

The main treatment is chemotherapy. Some children may receive a stem cell (bone marrow) transplant.

Symptoms of infant ALL

Symptoms of relapsed or refractory ALL include:

Fatigue

Fever

Pain in the bones or joints

Frequent infections

Easy bruising and bleeding that is hard to stop

Tiny, flat, dark-red skin spots (petechiae)

Lumps in the neck, underarm, stomach, or groin

Pain or fullness below the rib cage

Paleness

Loss of appetite

Shortness of breath

Enlarged liver

Enlarged spleen

Diagnosis of infant ALL

Diagnosis of infant ALL involves:

Physical exam and medical history

Complete blood count test

Blood chemistry studies to check for amounts of certain substances

Liver function tests

Bone marrow aspiration and biopsy

Lumbar puncture

More tests will determine the specific kind of ALL. There are 2 main types: B–cell ALL and T–cell ALL. This information will have an impact on treatment approaches.

The road for this beautiful family has a lot of unknowns and the financial support you can offer will help them as they try to navigate through this tough time.

Mahalo!