Quote:
Originally Posted by d-null
let us know how it goes, curious how those are done exactly
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I can tell you already since I have had several in my life.
They take you down to a very cold room. Almost all rooms are super cold on floors that have the nuclear medicine machines; X-ray, CT scan, Pet scan, MRI, Radiation therapy, and so forth. I think they keep it so cold because of all the machines in operation plus computers going. Where as in surgery they have other reasons. Perhaps if I remember I will ask for a 100% answer.
You get put on your back on a mechanical table. Some hospitals have a pretty mural painted on the ceiling. There is this giant white smooth star gate circle at the foot of the table. There is also another room where the tech can work the machines at. Typically the tech will then come over and (often wearing some protective gear) take a syringe out of a metal case and inject that into your IV (radiation contrast, and Sticky is afraid of flu vaccine LOL)
15 minutes latter we can begin. (sometimes that may strap you down or secure a body part). They will be in their room and then turn the machine on which sounds pretty loud. They press buttons and you slide slowly into the machine to about where they want to scan (for me pelvis, hips, lower back, thighs, but odds say they will go to head). Machine brings you to a certain point and it starts to spin the magnets or whatever. The tech may say "take a breath, hold it" which will come out of the machine and they will slide you more into it and then the tech will say "breath" and you exhale cause it feels like forever. They do that a few times and then they say "all done".
You then wait about 30 more minutes in the cold ass room waiting for transport (people who bring you places in the hospital). When they arrive they will transfer you off the hard table, back to the gurney or my instance my bed. Then they will drive me back to my room.
The actual scan only takes about 7-10 minutes. Waiting for the contrast to spread in your body is another 15. Waiting on transport is another 30-60 minutes. Lastly there is the chance you may have to wait for your turn in the CT machine which can take all of the above time, plus any time to clean up the table which I do not know.
You will not get any results from the tech. They do not read the results, well they do but not in the way you want. They just make sure there are no flares or other image problems that will prevent the proper people from reading them, which would result in another CT scan. It unfortunately is not like you see on House. There are no doctors running the tests, in the little room.
Though on the flip side I am getting "teams" of doctors coming in to see me. These teams are often 3-5 people and they do talk over issues with you and disappear/come back with new ideas or tests. Which is a lot like House.
Any questions?