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MRI Scanner – the words make me think putting myself inside a tiny Smarties tube, due to the similarly circular nature, but in practice, as Bruce Willis said in Die Hard, playing hard-as-nails cop John McClane, “Now I know what a god-damn TV dinner feels like!”, such is the restricted feeling you get.
The basis behind it follows my aortic valve replacement operation in 1994, and both before and after that I have had regular check-ups at the Manchester Royal Infirmary. Then after a recent check-up, five months ago, I was referred for an MRI scanner appointment due to an “anomaly” in one of my heart chambers. My consultant was a Mr Borg, so I can say that in my life, I have ‘engaged the Borg’.
I wish I’d taken a picture at the time, but it looked like the equivalent of if my dentist had taken an x-ray of my teeth when there’s a piece of chicken stuck in them – just a fleshly little mass flapping about, pointlessly, but just won’t go away.
Anyway, this anomaly could be something or nothing. Either way, I suggested to the doctor that he put his thumb over the x-ray machine to hide the problem, which he subsequently did, and I went “Yay!”… but that still didn’t absolve me of having to have this procedure.
After waiting for ages, the appointment finally happened last Wednesday. Based on what I know about an MRI Scanner, they allow you to take in a CD to listen to during the procedure, so I took in a Prog Rock disc which I bought from a charity shop for 19p. It’s called “Out There” and features Asia, Caravan and Porcupine Tree, hoping I could listen to that. Unfortunately, I couldn’t, since (a) this particular machine wasn’t set up to cater for external music being filtered in, and (b) the doctor in charge would regularly tell me to “breathe in, breathe out, hold your breath”, and so on.
Things I didn’t like about this procedure beforehand? Well, it was a 10.30am appointment, yet they wanted me there NINETY minutes early so they could take some bloods. However, that was a relatively small part of the proceedings and from then on it was about 20 minutes until I went into the room, so certain elements of it moved on apace more than I expected.
Alas, it was to be held at Wythenshawe Hospital. My issue with that place? Well, for three times in just over a year, my father had been admitted there due to not being well at all. I will just say that he’s now out of hospital and back home, but I’ve been back and forth to that place so many times in the last year or so that I’m pig-sick of the place. That has no bearing on the staff, by the way. They’re all great. Apart from Nurse Ratched in one of the wards where, after arriving around 20 minutes before mealtime hours, after a long day at work, despite my telling her of my situation, she basically ordered me out of there and told me I could wait in some other room for an hour until “protected mealtime” was over. Well, she could fuck right off. I wish I’d complained at the time, but at that point I’d brought along the items my Dad needed there and then, and arranged to call him later on to continue our conversation, since by the time “protected mealtime” was over, it would be almost time for MY mealtime, and the M60 traffic would be getting even more of a nightmare.
The parking is a nightmare, there, too. It’s £3.00 for up to 2hrs, £4.00 for 3hrs, and so on. I wouldn’t mind if the parking charges went to the hospital itself, but as with all others I’ve ever visited, all the money goes to the private company who has erected the horrible barriers the stop you getting out without paying. And that’s why I used to love the car park area by the maternity unit, since those barriers were broken for around a year, so I would always park in there. Unfortunately, on my last trip there, while my father was still inside, the barrier had been fixed and I made a quick turn before having to go inside. Instead, I park by some nearby shops before you reach the hospital. This means I have to walk past an area of vast undergrowth which reminded me of a section in The Last Of Us (go to 7:45 at the video below).
Oh, and what I also hate about Wythenshawe Hospital is that outside they have numerous “NO SMOKING” signs, yet they have scores of patients and visitors sat right next to them… SMOKING! And no-one bothers to do anything about this, so to get into the hospital, you have to walk past a load of smelly, ignorant bastards.
Go to page 2 for more on my MRI Scanner experience.
The Last Of Us: Walkthrough: Part 12 – Bill’s Town: Graveyard (720p HD) – DVDfeverGames
At this appointment, I was going to an area I’d never been before – The North West Heart Centre. Ridiculous directions from the main entrance sent you down the yellow route, turning various corners, and eventually sending me up some stairs… only for another direction to send me back to them them to first check in at the outpatients area. Which didn’t seem to exist. However, there was an Information desk which sent me back outside, through a different door, to walk round as it’s apparently quicker, since the alternative was to walk around a number of upstairs corridors and go all around the houses. Once I’d finally arrived in the right place, I had to go down some stairs to a waiting area with other people, which put me in mind of the 1972 horror movie, Tales From The Crypt, where five people meet up, after having got lost down there, and are brought together by the Crypt Keeper (played by the late, great Sir Ralph Richardson). Unfortunately, for them, they are all dead, and head off to the gates of hell. For me, I was already there, but just happened to still be alive.
I was ushered in the direction of a changing room where my valuables could be locked away, and I was to put on a gown. I assumed they would want me in my altogether, so put the gown on back to front (as is usually the way in hospitals), but still had my socks on as the floor was cold – and I don’t like walking around barefoot. Yes, ladies, I am not into any kind of foot fetish!
At that point, I had a last ‘google’ on my phone to see if I was allowed to wear underwear while inside an MRI scanner and it seemed that I was. Then, the doctor came in to discuss a few things, and I asked my clothing question. Given how he said I needed to turn the gown the right way round, so they could attach ECG pads to my skin, pants would certainly be a necessity, since I don’t want my old chap to be flapping about while I was subjected to whatever happens in one of these machines.
 
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About the MRI Scanner appointment itself, and once I’d been invited in to the side room to have bloods taken via a needle plunged into a vein – and kudos to the doctor for doing this on the first go, since I usually don’t have good veins and when I go for my annual hypertension review, it takes the nurse forever to find one, and since I take warfarin, which thins the blood, I end up with a huge bruise. It’s no-one’s fault, it’s just one of those things and an occupational hazard… if having a crap heart was an occupation.
Since the scanning may take 50 minutes or so – the time-frame I was given, although it must’ve been just over an hour, given the time when I looked at my watch on going back to the changing room – I figured a trip to the loo would be an idea even though I didn’t really need it. Still, you don’t want to be having to come out of the tube and then go back in, so if you are having one of these scans, then it’s best just to go and point Percy at the porcelain or, for women, whatever you call your genitals.
While lying on the machine, awaiting to go in, I had some sort of guard placed on my chest, and was strapped to the table so that I could not wriggle free. Good job this wasn’t one of those films where you’re held against your will in a mental institution, not knowing what’s going on. And when I went into the machine initially, I felt a little claustrophobic, so they stopped very briefly, the continued to see how I went. Once I got to the other end, I could look up and out of the back end of the machine and see normality again, so it wasn’t too bad in that respect.
The aforementioned needle was left in so that a contrast agent called Gadavist was applied. I know it sounds like a character in Game of Thrones, but it’s actually a liquid which sometimes makes you feel warm inside, and sometimes cold. Either way, you can’t wait for it all to be over, especially when having to hold my breath for a long time and/or frequently, and while the experience inside the machine was amusing early on, as it all dragged a bit, I got itches and watering eyes, due to a cold, all of which I could do nothing about.
I was warned about the amount of noise that the machine would make, although most of that seems to come from all the construction just outside the building. They also had to put some patches on my chest for the ECG tabs to stick on, which required shaving of small areas of my chest. That still itches now 🙁
There was a bit of amusement when the machine made noises, as whatever passed through my bodies made it feel like someone had made my hair stand on end with static electricity. When I commented on it, the doctor said something to describe it, but which has escaped my thought processes. If/when I remember, I shall add it in here.
In lieu of any music, they had some beating sound going on in the background which was the right pace for Bloodhound Gang‘s one-hit-wonder, The Bad Touch – thus putting me off concentrating on breathing out at times, and so that is the song with which I will leave you.
Bloodhound Gang – The Bad Touch
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.
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