The miscarriage saga continues...anti-Kell - part 2
As if the miscarriage saga couldn't continue...it did (the below was written in September 2019, and took place in August 2018)...
In lab work that was done prior to the D&C, my results showed a positive antibody. Prior to my D&C, when my doctor came in to visit with me before the surgery, he asked if I had ever had a transfusion and then asked if I'd ever had an positive antibody screening, because he didn't remember that, and of course, I had never had either of those. My doctor then went on to say we'd recheck in clinic because 3 of his 4 surgeries that morning showed positive for antibodies. Surely it was some flaw in the reactant because how could 75% of the tests that very morning be positive?
At my D&C follow up appointment two weeks after the surgery, we did bloodwork to test my HCG level (since cell testing results had shown the partial molar pregnancy indicators), but to also do another antibody screening. It took several weeks for the bloodwork to come back, and when it did, it showed I still tested positive for antibodies.
This time, we got more information. The test showed I had developed the anti-kell antibody. Which, let me tell you, when you google this, it is SCARY AS HELL! I, of course, had never heard of this, and didn't understand this at all. My nurse couldn't really tell me much, other than there was nothing to do about it at the moment, and if I were to become pregnant again, we'd just monitor it.
That really wasn't good enough for me. So I immediately start researching and try to understand what this means for me, for any future pregnancies, and how I could have possibly developed this.
In a nutshell - {disclaimer, I am not a doctor and I am gathering this from research and from other women's experience, along with a conversation we had with an MFM} - Dusty has the kell antigen. This is a sugar in his blood (in basic terms) which is the kell antigen. Likely through my miscarriage (although initially I figured it was through Kanon and Remi's pregnancy, more on that later), blood from the baby mixed with mine, and my body responded to the kell antigen in Dusty's blood by developing these antibodies.
In that initial call on 8/27, my nurse called to tell me the titer level (a way of measuring degree of antibodies) was too low to detect. From my initial research, this provided some level of comfort, although it seemed like this could increase during the pregnancy, if I were to get pregnant again, so I didn't take too much comfort from this. Subsequently, through an odd sort of mix-up with my lab, another screening was ordered, and it showed my titer increased to 1:64, which indicated that the exposure to the kell antigen was recent, and my body was increasing it's antibodies. It also indicated my kell antibodies were at critical level (whether or not kell antibodies have a critical level is actually a debatable subject in the medical community and probably the accurate way of stating this is kell is always critical). I found this out on September 5, and was further devastated.
There are various types of antibodies and kell is one of the worst. In other antibodies, critical levels increase the care and monitoring in pregnancies, but in kell, it is almost always treated as critical and the pregnancy is monitored very closely. Pregnancies are monitored through what are called "MCA" scans, or middle cerebral artery. This is done through an ultrasound where they scan the baby's brain to measure the speed of bloodflow in the brain. The faster the bloodflow, the more indicative the baby is anemic, which is the risk of kell. In kell, the kell antibodies in my blood attack the baby's red blood cells, destroying them, causing the baby to become anemic. When the baby becomes anemic, the baby then needs inutero transfusions.
In lab work that was done prior to the D&C, my results showed a positive antibody. Prior to my D&C, when my doctor came in to visit with me before the surgery, he asked if I had ever had a transfusion and then asked if I'd ever had an positive antibody screening, because he didn't remember that, and of course, I had never had either of those. My doctor then went on to say we'd recheck in clinic because 3 of his 4 surgeries that morning showed positive for antibodies. Surely it was some flaw in the reactant because how could 75% of the tests that very morning be positive?
At my D&C follow up appointment two weeks after the surgery, we did bloodwork to test my HCG level (since cell testing results had shown the partial molar pregnancy indicators), but to also do another antibody screening. It took several weeks for the bloodwork to come back, and when it did, it showed I still tested positive for antibodies.
This time, we got more information. The test showed I had developed the anti-kell antibody. Which, let me tell you, when you google this, it is SCARY AS HELL! I, of course, had never heard of this, and didn't understand this at all. My nurse couldn't really tell me much, other than there was nothing to do about it at the moment, and if I were to become pregnant again, we'd just monitor it.
That really wasn't good enough for me. So I immediately start researching and try to understand what this means for me, for any future pregnancies, and how I could have possibly developed this.
In a nutshell - {disclaimer, I am not a doctor and I am gathering this from research and from other women's experience, along with a conversation we had with an MFM} - Dusty has the kell antigen. This is a sugar in his blood (in basic terms) which is the kell antigen. Likely through my miscarriage (although initially I figured it was through Kanon and Remi's pregnancy, more on that later), blood from the baby mixed with mine, and my body responded to the kell antigen in Dusty's blood by developing these antibodies.
In that initial call on 8/27, my nurse called to tell me the titer level (a way of measuring degree of antibodies) was too low to detect. From my initial research, this provided some level of comfort, although it seemed like this could increase during the pregnancy, if I were to get pregnant again, so I didn't take too much comfort from this. Subsequently, through an odd sort of mix-up with my lab, another screening was ordered, and it showed my titer increased to 1:64, which indicated that the exposure to the kell antigen was recent, and my body was increasing it's antibodies. It also indicated my kell antibodies were at critical level (whether or not kell antibodies have a critical level is actually a debatable subject in the medical community and probably the accurate way of stating this is kell is always critical). I found this out on September 5, and was further devastated.
There are various types of antibodies and kell is one of the worst. In other antibodies, critical levels increase the care and monitoring in pregnancies, but in kell, it is almost always treated as critical and the pregnancy is monitored very closely. Pregnancies are monitored through what are called "MCA" scans, or middle cerebral artery. This is done through an ultrasound where they scan the baby's brain to measure the speed of bloodflow in the brain. The faster the bloodflow, the more indicative the baby is anemic, which is the risk of kell. In kell, the kell antibodies in my blood attack the baby's red blood cells, destroying them, causing the baby to become anemic. When the baby becomes anemic, the baby then needs inutero transfusions.
So....you can imagine how I was reeling trying to take in all of this information. It was so hard, so scary.
More to come...
Comments
Post a Comment