Cat scans sadly don't involve cats

 

     Cat scans, other wise known in the medical world as CT scans, sadly, do not involve any sort of cats. I mean, it would be quite amusing to just swipe a cat over your body in mid air a few times but it's probably not going to give doctors the answers they were after either.

    What they do involve though is something that looks a bit like a whirling time machine. This whirling and chunking machine takes a whole lotta x-rays from multiple angles and combines them into a cross sectional picture of your soft tissue and bones inside your body.

Why I Need To Get Scanned

    For me, this test was to look at my intestinal system for abscesses, fistulas or blockages currently going on as well as scar tissue from inflammation. I've been having a lot of localized pain and the doctor wanted to see if there had been any changes since my last scan about a year ago.

Outpatient Care Rocks !

   The scan, as mentioned above is one that I've had several times before. Luckily this one was by appointment at the hospital rather than me coming into the ER with extreme pain. I was pleasantly surprised that, this time around I had many "fun" flavors of barium to pick from instead of the nasty gunk I've had in the ER. I voiced my choice of banana and waited for my medical milkshake to appear.

  Since, I had an appointment it all moved pretty swiftly. I got one of those nifty hospital bands with all my impertinent patient info and than was escorted back to the waiting room to drink my "banana" shake.

   I drank both bottles rather quickly. I've found with previous experiences, its just best to chug the stuff down and get it over with. The longer you wait, the more it tastes like warm eggnog. Once you've ingested the lovely concoction that will make your insides visible on the scan, there is nothing left to do but wait. The drink has to make it's way through your system before you can actually go in for the test.

So you wait.  Sadly, you will not glow in the dark after consumption. I checked when I flicked the lights off in the bathroom. No glow. No super powers. Darn.

    Fortunately, when you are an outpatient at a hospital though, they actually allow you to wander away. You just need to promise to be back in time for the allotted scan. I promised like a 100 times because there was no way I was gonna drink that concoction again.

At least not that day.

In the Vortex 

    Forty-five minutes later, I was back from sitting in the hospital's lovely garden reading my kindle and ready to rock this test. Just like before, things moved swiftly. I was ushered into a back room where the machine was with a technician and nurse. They helped me up onto the machine bed and set up an IV line to run the contrast.

    Within a few minutes they had everything ready and the very kind nurse started the machine and warned me that she was about to run the contrast.

Why did she warn me ?

    Well, the contrast that is pushed through your veins just as the test starts gives you this sudden intense warm sensation throughout your body. It also makes you feel like you're peeing your pants. No, really. You don't actually pee your pants. But it's a really good imitation of the same sensation.

     After that though, the test isn't so bad. The machine hums and whirls around your mid section while you lay on a metal bed that gives off the sensation of floating in air. Its rather quick and not very loud but you can't bring music in with you like an mp3 player. So you are left there with just your thoughts and the sound of the machine working it's magic.

   I just closed my eyes while it went on and pretended that I was in the TARDIS swirling around in a time vortex. Sadly when it was over, no Time Lord Doctor Who's appeared.

( I wanted Tennant or Troughton to appear but would have accepted Smith )
The staff though that helped that day were all fabulous.

Results :

  I have an appointment in September to discuss the next step of my care.

  For me, the scans showed that I have scar tissue and that's probably the cause of my daily pain.
My doctor wants to refer my case to Mount Sinai Hospital where they are more able to deal with difficult cases of crohn's disease. I am sad that my doctor can't help me further but hope that perhaps I can find a treatment that does not require surgery at this time.

Until than I ponder the possibilities and do my usual tricks to keep my alien at bay and happy within me. My next post will delve into these ways.