Charlie in Dayton
15-August-2005, 06:07 PM
I sit here, quietly typing, glowing in the dark...I am detectably radioactive...
Stress test day. Up at 630 AM (that's stressful enough), scrape off the top layer, gaze longingly at the cereal box on the counter in the kitchen, but no no, can't eat...745 in the sawbones' office...I get examined/poked/prodded/questioned cursorily, then the magic elixir gets injected. I'm now officially a walking WMD...onto the...what do I call it? Two detectors, at 90 degrees to each other, rotating about the body, 32 pictures taken at about every 3 degs of rotation...a little Photoshoppery, a little image stacking (you think I'm kidding? That's exactly how they do it, just like we do for them there faint fuzzies a few zillion miles away...) and now there's a 3-D image of my ticker at rest. Next stop, The Dungeon, with The Treadmill of Doom...
Anyone who's ever seen me knows that I'm not an Olympic caliber anything, but to see if my heart's gonna do an Alien and jump out and run under an equipment cart, we gotta get the heart rate up. I lasted for six minutes, the heart rate got over 150, and ye olde BP got to som'ers around 180/80 or 90...I quizzed the tech closely...apparently those numbers are not really outrageous, especially since my pulse was back down under 100 in a couple of minutes' rest, and the BP dropped commensurately...hey, maybe that diet and exercise (and I really
do need to work up a sweat on a more regular basis) paid off...they let me walk out of the treadmill room, and that's supposedly the best sign of all...right at the end, with my heartbeat thundering in my ears, another gill of Dr. Feelgood's Nuclear Heart Particles...
So after we go relax for about 45 minutes (and with permission scarf down two lean turkey on wheat sannawiches and a bottle of water...ain't I healthy?), it's time for more pictures. The procedure takes about 15 minutes or so, with you laying on a narrow table, your arms over your head (there's a rest to brace 'em on) and a wide wrapping around your torso to minimize movement from breathing. Another 32 pix, and now we have a comparative set to create a 3-D image of the heart after a load's been put on it. While you're lying there, a screen shows you real-time moving images of your heart from each detector...the tech says that there's not much that can be determined from those images, the important ones are post-processing...but I could see definite differences in the two sets. The increased bloodflow puts more particles in various places, and I could see where post-load there had been increased flow to various heart muscles. The outline of a heart was plainly visible. That's an odd yet extremely interesting sight to see, realizing that the fist-size ball of glowing muscles that's squirming on the screen is what's keeping you alive...
Anyway, all the information I got today was reassuring...while it was extremely preliminary, no one had a worried look on their face, or whistled at a result, or said to someone else "Hey, c'mere and take a look at this", or screamed "HOLY CRAP!!" and went running from the room...so I guess I'll live until Doc Malone gives me the official word next week...back to the CD's...gotta put that Indy slide show together...
Stress test day. Up at 630 AM (that's stressful enough), scrape off the top layer, gaze longingly at the cereal box on the counter in the kitchen, but no no, can't eat...745 in the sawbones' office...I get examined/poked/prodded/questioned cursorily, then the magic elixir gets injected. I'm now officially a walking WMD...onto the...what do I call it? Two detectors, at 90 degrees to each other, rotating about the body, 32 pictures taken at about every 3 degs of rotation...a little Photoshoppery, a little image stacking (you think I'm kidding? That's exactly how they do it, just like we do for them there faint fuzzies a few zillion miles away...) and now there's a 3-D image of my ticker at rest. Next stop, The Dungeon, with The Treadmill of Doom...
Anyone who's ever seen me knows that I'm not an Olympic caliber anything, but to see if my heart's gonna do an Alien and jump out and run under an equipment cart, we gotta get the heart rate up. I lasted for six minutes, the heart rate got over 150, and ye olde BP got to som'ers around 180/80 or 90...I quizzed the tech closely...apparently those numbers are not really outrageous, especially since my pulse was back down under 100 in a couple of minutes' rest, and the BP dropped commensurately...hey, maybe that diet and exercise (and I really
do need to work up a sweat on a more regular basis) paid off...they let me walk out of the treadmill room, and that's supposedly the best sign of all...right at the end, with my heartbeat thundering in my ears, another gill of Dr. Feelgood's Nuclear Heart Particles...
So after we go relax for about 45 minutes (and with permission scarf down two lean turkey on wheat sannawiches and a bottle of water...ain't I healthy?), it's time for more pictures. The procedure takes about 15 minutes or so, with you laying on a narrow table, your arms over your head (there's a rest to brace 'em on) and a wide wrapping around your torso to minimize movement from breathing. Another 32 pix, and now we have a comparative set to create a 3-D image of the heart after a load's been put on it. While you're lying there, a screen shows you real-time moving images of your heart from each detector...the tech says that there's not much that can be determined from those images, the important ones are post-processing...but I could see definite differences in the two sets. The increased bloodflow puts more particles in various places, and I could see where post-load there had been increased flow to various heart muscles. The outline of a heart was plainly visible. That's an odd yet extremely interesting sight to see, realizing that the fist-size ball of glowing muscles that's squirming on the screen is what's keeping you alive...
Anyway, all the information I got today was reassuring...while it was extremely preliminary, no one had a worried look on their face, or whistled at a result, or said to someone else "Hey, c'mere and take a look at this", or screamed "HOLY CRAP!!" and went running from the room...so I guess I'll live until Doc Malone gives me the official word next week...back to the CD's...gotta put that Indy slide show together...