Takes a Lickin' and Keeps on Tickin', Pt. 2

30 minutes and a large waxed cup of cold water later, the nurse who injected the isotope led me into an imaging room with a flat table much longer than a human body. She directed me to lay on one end of the table and asked me to remove the gown, stretch my arms over my head, while she attached three stickers with metal nodes at the center to both my shoulders and above my right hip. "This scan's going to last about 20 minutes. Keep your hands over your head the entire time." The table slowly raised then glided toward a large brownish square plate at the opposite end of the table. The nurse slipped a set of headphones into my ears once the table stopped moving. "You can wiggle your fingers or toes but try not to move your chest. You may even want to take a nap; most patients do." She disappeared, and an Yanniesque version of Scarborough Fair filtered into my ears. I heard a click and noticed the plate slowly lowering to just above my chest and begin a slow orbit of me. As it circled, another plate came into view, looking like to thick and metallic slices of bread and with the moderate heat pulsing from them, I felt like a rotisserie chicken waiting to be made into a sandwich.

Once we finished, I followed the nurse back across the lobby to the Treadmill #2 room and hopped onto a gurney. "Another nurse will be in soon to get you ready for the treadmill, okay?" I nodded and smiled, returning to my book about a Nun trying to leave a convent in 18th century Paris and all the hardships and disgraces her order set upon her. After 10 pages, the new nurse arrived and jovially explained what was going to happen as she attached more metal nodes to my torso. To these, she clamped an array of gray-covered wires, all feeding into a black box which she belted about my waist. "Now, sit back on the gurney, and I'm going to take your blood pressure so we have an 'at rest' reading." She velcroed the cuff around my right arm, pressed a button on a wall unit which inflated the cuff. "Okay. Now, we're just waiting for the doctor to get here so we can start the treadmill."

And we waited. After 15 minutes, a second nurse appeared and asked why we hadn't started. "We're waiting for the doctor."

"He's still at the hospital, but Dr. S_ is here. He should be able to do it." She left to find the other doctor and soon re=appeared. "He's on his way. Go ahead and get him ready."

I stepped onto the treadmill. The nurse adjusted the wires so as not to get in the way and velcroed another blood pressure cuff, this time to my left arm. "When the machine starts, it's going to be at a regular pace. Every few minutes, the speed will increase and the platform will rise up, okay?" I nodded. The doctor walked in, greeting the nurses and gave the okay to begin. For the next few minutes, I kept pace with the treadmill while the nurse checked my blood pressure. The nurse from the beginning came into the room carrying another radioactive cylinder. Once the first speed increase occurred, she injected more isotope into my IV, then started chatting with the other nurse. Things were going well as far as I could tell, but I felt the blood pressure cuff beginning to slip. I said as much, but apparently not loud enough because they didn't react until I screamed in pain as the cuff slid over my IV and partially ripped its needle from my arm.

Thankfully, the test ended a few minutes after that, and after a painful removal of the tape that held the IV in place (thanks to hairy arms), I was back in the locker room, changing into my jeans and a fresh t-shirt. The nurse from the beginning handed me a cup of cold water and asked me to follow her back to the imaging room. "Just one more scan, and you'll be out of here." I hopped up onto the table where she again clamped the wires to the metal nodes still attached to my chest. This time, I almost fell asleep as the theme from Chariots of Fire wafted through the headphones.

"And, we're done!" I climbed off the table and checked my bag to make sure I had all the papers, my book, cell phone, and such. "Do you have a follow up scheduled?" Yes, it's supposed to be this coming Wednesday. "All right then. You're free to go." I thanked her and quickly walked out the doors to my car, heaving a sigh of relief as I merged onto PCH.