Wednesday, June 04, 2008
A Closed MRI Has Got to Be One of the Loudest Damn Things on the Face of the Earth
They will offer you ear plugs before they slide you in. Take them.
I took one that had a "two-hour delay" last night. That means they slide you in for one set of scans, then inject you with some dyes, then slide you back in for a few more scans, then they slide you out, you get dressed again and you come back in two hours.
"How come I have to come back in two hours?"
"Because some things...enhance."
Translation: Whatever it is that could kill you could turn different colors after two hours.
"Can I eat?"
"Yes."
I was going to take a walk around the Museum Mile Festival, but as it was, I barely had enough time to go to a nearby seafood restaurant for a light supper. By the time I left Sinai, it was 10:00. The radiology department had run out of outpatients for the night and the only people there were inpatients and emergency room patients, being wheeled in on stretchers, in gowns. Been there, been that, and the words "Hill-Rom" on wheeled beds being pushed by orderlies are branded into my memory.
So again I'm waiting for a phone call. I figure it took them a while to come in and read my scans, since it wasn't an emergency. It's to prove that I have something that isn't deadly, since the protocol for confirming something in your digestive tract they think is deadly is to give you a CT scan. Apparently, the non-deadly things enhance better on an MRI.
And so I wait.
Update, Friday Morning: Benign nodules on liver and lungs.
The radiologist suggested I get a CT scan for the lung nodules. Been there, done that. My name is going to be Nuke Me Till I Glow.
I took one that had a "two-hour delay" last night. That means they slide you in for one set of scans, then inject you with some dyes, then slide you back in for a few more scans, then they slide you out, you get dressed again and you come back in two hours.
"How come I have to come back in two hours?"
"Because some things...enhance."
Translation: Whatever it is that could kill you could turn different colors after two hours.
"Can I eat?"
"Yes."
I was going to take a walk around the Museum Mile Festival, but as it was, I barely had enough time to go to a nearby seafood restaurant for a light supper. By the time I left Sinai, it was 10:00. The radiology department had run out of outpatients for the night and the only people there were inpatients and emergency room patients, being wheeled in on stretchers, in gowns. Been there, been that, and the words "Hill-Rom" on wheeled beds being pushed by orderlies are branded into my memory.
So again I'm waiting for a phone call. I figure it took them a while to come in and read my scans, since it wasn't an emergency. It's to prove that I have something that isn't deadly, since the protocol for confirming something in your digestive tract they think is deadly is to give you a CT scan. Apparently, the non-deadly things enhance better on an MRI.
And so I wait.
Update, Friday Morning: Benign nodules on liver and lungs.
The radiologist suggested I get a CT scan for the lung nodules. Been there, done that. My name is going to be Nuke Me Till I Glow.
