22
Hospital Stays
It will become routine for you to go in and out of hospital over a period of several
months and there are many practical ways of helping you to manage the inevitable
disruption this causes.You are also likely to be admitted to hospital for your child to
receive antibiotics if they have an infection or their blood count is low.
When your child is receiving chemotherapy treatment he or she is likely to feel ill for
some or even all of the time. It will take a few cycles of chemotherapy to refne the
level of anti-sickness drugs best for your child and it’s important you let the medical
team know what has and hasn’t worked.
It is likely that you will want to stay with your child if he or she needs to be in
hospital both to provide comfort and support and to help care for him or her.
Remember your child may need to spend time in hospital unexpectedly so you
might need to drop your plans at the last minute – this can be diffcult and you
will probably feel out of control of the situation (as we did) but we learnt that it is
important you remain as fexible as possible during this stressful time.
Section 3