Wednesday, June 24, 2009

BONES


(As they say in Hollywood, Adapted from a True Story.)

I have been having pain in my right hip area for several weeks, and the doctors have not yet determined the cause. So Monday my M.D. recommended I get a bone scan of the area. My appointment was yesterday, and I showed up at the appropriate time. No. Wait. That isn’t quite correct. I showed up at nuclear medicine when they told me to -- the appropriate time would have been 30 minutes later.

Hold on --what is nuclear medicine? It is a branch of medicine and medical imaging that uses radioactive isotopes in the diagnosis and treatment of disease. They use a gadget that looks somewhat like an oversized, out of shape, doughnut. Well, that’s what came to my mind. They laid me out on this narrow table, covered me with a warm blanket, and told me not to move. Then the “doughnut” moved back and forth over the table (and me), as well as tilt from side to side, and took pictures. At least that’s what I was told.

My M.D. had ordered a bone scan of my right hip/groin/thigh/buttock area, and I wondered why this was taking so long. Then when my head was above the “doughnut”, I glanced to my right, and there on a computer monitor was -- me -- without any skin. How embarrassing! I asked the technician why my whole skeleton was there, and he said he had called my doctor and requested to do the whole body scan. Apparently my doctor agreed.

Somehow I got the notion that I had been chosen “Bone Model of the Week”, and I will appear in the next issue of BONES TO PONDER, a new scientific publication due out sometime in the next decade.

When it was over, the technician assured me that the glow around my body would fade within 24 hours, but warned me to not go outside at night as I might scare the bejabbers out of other people and animals.

Now this video may not be funny, but it certainly is astonishing.
Maybe from a magic show?
Dunno.

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