Category Archives: hospitals

pet scan

21 Saturday Jun 2008

Posted by in cancer, health & happiness, hospitals

≈ 8 Comments

PET: positron emission tomography

What an ordeal! A much more complicated process than with the CT scan, but at least I didn’t have to drink that awful barium sulphate crap. My appointment was at 9.45 – I thought it would be nice to walk through the park that time of day so Nog & I left early to make the 45-minute trek to the hospital. I wasn’t allowed to have any brekky, which didn’t bother me, but I was totally jonesing for a coffee.

As soon as I got to the nuclear medicine department they brought me into the injection room (gaaaa!) and stuck an IV thingy in my hand vein (ouch!) . The guy who did it was actually quite good and only had to do it twice. Then he gave me a serious tranquiliser and muscle relaxant, took a blood sample, hooked up a bottle of saline solution and injected me with some FDG (radioactive isotope). After this he said he had to leave the room as I would be emitting radiation (eep!) and that I was to sit there in my comfy reclining chair for an hour and let the drugs totally relax me.

Then I got put through the PET machine, which is similar to the CT one but it takes longer (about half an hour compared to ten minutes). After that they sent me away to have something to eat and said I’d have to come back an hour and a half later to be put through the machine again. But the second time was faster – about ten minutes.

The Team said they were going to let me know the results by Tuesday, so then I should know whether I’ll be starting chemo on Friday or if I’ll have to have more surgery first … time for some of that medicinal chilled white wine I reckon.

still adrift …

19 Thursday Jun 2008

Posted by in cancer, friends, health & happiness, home, hospitals, life stuff

≈ 13 Comments

Yesterday I was supposed to start chemo …

Since my operation in May I have been pretty much been living in limbo. It wasn’t so apparent during the first couple of weeks that I was recovering from surgery, but as soon as started feeling better I also started realising that this was just the first step. I still had to find out if the tumour that had been removed (along with a metre of my colon) was malignant and, if so, whether the cancer had spread.

Two weeks ago I was told the tumour was indeed malignant and a week later I had a CT scan to see if I was ‘clean’ or not. And yesterday I found out that I’m not. Or maybe I’m not. The CT scan showed a small lesion in my liver that may or may not be cancerous. [editor’s note: gaaaaaaa!!!]

I was told I would need a PET scan and if the lesion turned out to be malignant I would then require more surgery, followed by chemo. But in the meantime I was still scheduled to start chemo this Friday (I’d put it off for a couple of days so I could meet nursemyra at the airport today without feeling ill). But it still didn’t make sense to start chemo and then stop it for surgery – if it came to that – and then start all over again a few weeks later.

And so I went down to the nuclear medicine department to see about getting a PET scan. Happily I know some people there so it turned out that I can have a PET scan this Saturday and get the results back by Monday (yay!). And when I told my oncologist this she immediately agreed about putting off the chemo till next week, until we find out if I’m going to need more surgery or not.

So if all goes well and I only need the preventative chemo (fingers crossed!) then that will start on the day after daisyfae arrives, which would also be better timing.

Meanwhile, I’m back in limbo.

chatterbox

11 Wednesday Jun 2008

Posted by in friends, health & happiness, home, hospitals

≈ 5 Comments

This post is dedicated to Bosco, my favourite chatterbox.

You know how I’ve been going on lately about wanting light & fluffy distraction, how I’m not up for having visitors (except Pipocas), and even how I often won’t answer my phone these days? Well, there is another exception to all that and that’s my friend and student Bosco, the 30-year-old son of another student Paloma, who is a good friend of Dr A (aka guspemar).

It all started while I was still in hospital . . .

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