IVIg Treatment

We took our son to the hospital this week for his monthly IVIg treatment. Since I'm not really an expert, I'll use Wikipedia's description of what that actually is:


Intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) is a blood product administered intravenously. It contains the pooled IgG(immunoglobulin (antibody) G) extracted from the plasma of over one thousand blood donors. IVIG's effects last between 2 weeks and 3 months. It is mainly used as treatment in three major categories:

  Immune deficiencies 

  Inflammartory and autoimmune diseases

  Acute infections.

The Neurologist's theory is that our son possibly has an autoimmune condition.  There has been no definitive confirmation but since our son's medications haven't been enough to keep away any breakthrough seizures, trying the treatment is worth a shot.  It takes 6 months to see if it's helping or not, and he just had his 4th treatment.  So, we're still in the trial phase.

He is surprisingly very calm at these hospital visits.  We take him to the hospital first thing in the morning and are there until mid afternoon.  He's only 7 but seems tougher than the teenagers.  A lot of patients require freezing before the IV is attempted and we've heard the odd cursing at the pain, but not our little guy.  He just breathes right through it, even through the 3-4 attempts it takes to find a good vein.  His strength amazes me.  


On the plus side, he gets to order almost anything he wants for lunch, watches TV, plays Xbox and sometimes gets to play in an attached playroom.  In fact, I think he enjoys being at the hospital all day with so many fun things at his disposal.  It's reassuring too that when the treatment is finished for the day we get to go home.  :)