Feeling like a lab rat

Just spent another looooong day at the hospital. It started with a neuropysch test at 8:30am. I was tested on everything from memorizing numbers, memorizing up to 20 words and trying to recite them all, to putting blocks into various patterns. The point of the tests were to establish a baseline for comparison when I retake the test in 6 months. I forgot to mention that Dr. Steinberg told me I would have to be back here in 6 months to evaluate my progress.

Since parking to tough to find at the hospital, we decided to eat lunch at the hospital cafeteria. It wasn't worth a picture or a comparison to our lunches earlier in the week. At 12:45pm was my Ultrasound on my lower legs to determine if I had any clots in my deep veins which would lead to serious complications during my surgery. Luckily, my tests were negative...no clots found.

At 3:00pm was my Brain Spect Scan with Diamox injection. This test was to monitor the amount of bloodflow to my brain. It was a long 2 hours. It started with 2 failed attempts to get the IV set up in my arm...the technician finally got a good vein on the third try. I look like a pin cushion now after the last few days of drawing blood and IV lines. I had to lie in a bed for about 15 minutes, in the dark, to reduce my brain activity before the technician inject the Diamox. The chemical dialates all my blood vessels to increase my blood flow. After another 10 minutes or so, a radioactive injection was given to me so they could see the blood in my brain. I was taken to the Spect Scan room where the actual test took about 25 minutes.

We met up with our new friends, Lily and John, for dinner. John has Moyamoya disease on the left side of his head and is going through the same series of testing that I am this week. It was comforting to meet a couple going through a similar situation. We compared stories on how we were diagnosed.

Spending all day at the hospital is very exhausting. One more day of testing to go...then we have the weekend off. I can't wait.