10/22/2012

This was the day of my first MRI for my research study.  I was a bit nervous because of course I didn't know what to expect. I arrived at 7:15am and had an IV cath put in since they will be drawling blood every 15mins for 4 hrs. I know a lot of blood and by the end I did get a little light headed.

I then when to another building were the MRI would take place. I had to change into scrubs because my pants had a zipper. I have been fasting since 7pm the night before.  I wasnt hungry at all at this point probably because I am still usually sleeping. I answered three pages of questions and then practiced playing the money game which i will play once I am in the machine. The game is a money game where two amounts of money show on the screen, one amount of money you get now & the other amount you get at a later date. For example $40 now or $49 in 2 weeks. Then you have about 4 secs to decide. the amounts and time frame change time.

While in the MRI I lay there with a pager in my left hand in case I need something, a clicker w/ two buttons for the money game in my right hand. I have a reader thing on my forhead and then a pair of goggles on which is how I would see the pictures of food and other objects and also to play the game.

I was in the machine for an hour at a time looking at the pictures and then playing the game and even got to watch the Simpsons for about 30mins. after 1 hr i come out and get to drink a shake which was around 10am then after that i had my 2nd blood draw and then filled out those 3 pages of questions again. Then back into the MRI machine again for another hour.

I then went back to the first building and had two more blood draw 30 mins apart from each other that i passed the time by watching tv. Then they fed me a huge meal ( i only had about half if that).

During this whole time I thought my contact in my left eye was irratating my eye and it was slightly pink when i got to the place. by the time i went back to the other building to have the final two blood draw, my eye was so red it looked like blood. The nurse that they have on site came in and said it was for sure not my contact and 100% pink eye :(   My mother owns a home day care and I later found out that one of the children was out with pink eye and another was waiting to be picked up because of possible pink eye! Figures a week before my surgery I would get sick.