More Cardiac Adventures-The MRI Incident

After recuperating from my cardiac adventures, I went back to work last week, on day shift no less. The temporary reassignment was something my boss wanted. At first I was hesitant, but a couple of hours into my first day back last Monday, I quickly realized it was a good idea. It took me at least to last Wednesday to find my groove again. Upon returning home and after getting cleaned up I pretty much crashed on the couch until it was time to go to bed. So, what that means is that I don't really have anything to write about other than my encounter with the MRI machine during the time I was a patient in the hospital.

Magnetic Resonance Imagining is one of those technologies that would border on magic to anyone from the early Twentieth century and before. Sure, they had X-ray machines back then, which were wonders in their own era. But X-ray images never approached the level of detail and information a MRI can provide. The only problem with MRI's is that they are not as flexible or as easily deployable as the much older X-ray machines.

Essentially, MRI's to me look like a huge, glossy plastic barrel with a narrow center. Throw in a futuristic table, which slides the patient laying on top into that narrow center and that describes nearly all of those machines. Even with the advantages offered by MRI's, problems begin to emerge as soon as anyone comes close to to them.

The first being the overwhelmingly strong magnetic fields an energized unit produces. I've heard horror stories about careless orderlies rolling metal beds or stretchers into the room where the MRI's magnetic field “grabs” them after it is activated and causes some major destruction. The second issue come into play when the patient has some sort of metal implant in their body. Let's just say when that is somehow overlooked and the patient is placed inside the unit, and the magnets are energized, things can get messy really fast.

My encounter with the MRI machine revolved around a completely different type of problem. See, I'm a big guy and the center of the machine where they insert the patient is quite small. Yes, that means claustrophobia, something that for me usually involved the feeling of being overwhelmed in a large and loud crowd.

The cardiologists working on me wanted a detailed map of the problem cells causing my heart to race uncontrollably. Such information would allow them to home in on those nasty buggers and literally kill them with small electric shocks. So, I was wheeled down to the MRI and placed on the table. As that is happening, the technician is telling me I can't move during the procedure and that I would have to hold my breath periodically.

Everything is good to go up until the technician starts telling me how cramped and confining the inside of the machine will be. I'm okay up until the point she starts telling me about how I might react once I am slid into the center of the machine. She pretty much hit every raw point that could trigger my latent claustrophobia in the space of twenty seconds. Of course, never having a MRI scan before all her words were pretty abstract concepts up until I was actually laying inside the machine.

Long story short, I lasted about fifteen seconds before I started squeezing the hell out of the little plastic ball on the end of long a cord which signaled to the technician I was in full panic mode. Even though I knew everything was okay and that just a foot away from the top of my head was the other opening on the back end of the MRI, I felt entombed.

Personally, I think the one aspect that really got to me was that the opening was so confining. My shoulders and arms were pressing tightly against the inside of the opening. What didn't help at all was that my nose was just an inch or two from the top of the opening. Truthfully, thinking about it now still bothers me quite a bit.

Luckily, the technician slide me out quickly and was able to give me medication that more than tamed my claustrophobia. The procedure then went on as planned, which lasted about an hour. Once it was over, the MRI technician did try to put a positive spin on my record breaking panic attack once I was out of the machine. Apparently, other patients panic much later during the procedure, which forces an abort and them having to do it all over again later. Somehow, I found that information small comfort.