Thursday, April 24, 2008

 X is for Xenon

Ok clearly this isn't the easiest letter to do, but I didn't want to be lame and do a fake x word or xray. SO I went with Xenon.

As I've said before, I am a Nuclear Medicine Technologist. One of my least favorite tests we do is a Xenon Lung scan. I hate this test because for one thing the most common symptom that makes them order it is shortness of breath. So what do we do? We make the patient lie flat on their backs. Then we stick a mask on them and pump Xenon into it and they feel even more like they are suffocating.

Another reason I hate it is because it is the one test we do that requires the most patient cooperation. And so we get these sick breathless people who are almost always claustrophobic for some reason and make them have to cooperate with this miserable test.

Fortunately, spiral CT's have taken over much of these tests away from us. But we still get the people who can't have contrast either because of allergy or decreased kidney function (those are the sickest of the sick, so an additional miserableness for them to have to do this much longer test.) I feel so mean doing this.

So yay, I actually came up with a few paragraphs for an X word! And BOO for Xenon lung scans!

Posted by Acinom @ 9:16 PM