It's not for fishing, but it is important. Anywhere we take E, the tacklebox goes with us too. As you can see, it's packed with pretty much all of his medications, and a number of other things:
It has EMLA patches to apply to his port. They numb the skin so that it's less painful when he's accessed with the needle. It has a couple of chemo drugs: 6-MP (mercaptopurine), and methotrexate. It has an anti-nausea medication called ondansetron which is given in conjunction with his doses of methotrexate. It has a pill cutter, and tweezers because E gets half a pill of 6-MP some nights, and a full pill on others. It has cotrimoxazole (Septra), an antibiotic given as a preventative measure against a form of pneumonia to which cancer patients are susceptible. There's a pill crusher to grind the aforementioned Septra pills into dust so we can mix it into puréed fruit or applesauce. There's acetaminophen (Tylenol) in case E is in any pain, such as the jaw pain side-effect he usually experiences from the bi-weekly doses of vincristine. It has to be acetaminophen, since cancer patients need to avoid ibuprofen. There's a couple of thermometers to test for fever in case he feels warm, a few clean, empty syringes for administering doses of medications, and drug information printouts that contain important information about dosages, instructions, and possible side-effects.
The tacklebox & lock were given to us by SickKids because of J. SickKids wants to minimize the chances of a sibling getting in to, and accidentally doing damage to themselves by ingesting these toxic drugs. It's always kept locked, until we need it.
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