Any GUYS had an ultrasound? (1 Viewer)

[Michael*K]

After enduring two days of questions like "Who knocked you up?", I finally went in yesterday to have an abdominal ultrasound. Had some serious heartburn back in November (now gone) and my doctor wanted to see if I had gall stones.
First thing off the bat was that I was shocked the hospital gown fit. Always hear horror stories about people's rear end sticking out. Mine stayed covered. As for the procedure, it was kind of an odd sensation...they squirt some warm gel all over your abdomen and move this wand back and forth, first on the right side, then on the front and finally on my left side. Had to suck in air a bunch of times, presumably so they could get a better read of the organs. I have to admit it kinda freaked me out that this tech was able to look at my insides, but wasn't qualified to tell me what she saw, if anything. (She claims she saw nothing, but I don't trust her. ) The radiologist reviews the pictures and gets back to my doctor. They captured 59 images during the procedure. Don't know if that's normal, good or bad. Anyhow, I guess I'll start bugging my doctor for the test results tomorrow.

 

[Bill Catherall]

I had an ultrasound done several years ago for my heart. During a regular physical checkup the doctor thought he heard a murmer (I think that's what he called it...anyway, it's when a valve opens twice in one beat...this causes some blood to flow backwards through the valve during the second opening). The doctor said it's not a big problem...it's just good to know if you have one. If you ever have to have major surgery then there's a higher risk of infection and they give you special medication.

Well, nothing showed up on the ultrasound. It turns out the doctor was just hearing an echo.

By the way, that goo they put on you is not for lubrication. It's used to get a good seal against your skin so the ultrasonic frequencies can pass through easier. You can't have an air gap.

 

[Steve Peterson]

I've had a couple. I was getting unbelievably painful stomache cramps, so the doc wanted to know what was going on. The worst was when the ultrasonicist told me "The heater is broke on the gel. This is going to be a little cold..."
Steve "Holy Crap! She was right" Peterson

 

[MickeS]

Yeah, I had an ultrasound a few years ago. It was a boy! No, actually, it was my liver that was acting up, and they wanted to see if something was wrong with it.

They didn't find anything wrong on the ultrasound (that didn't mean there wasn't anything wrong with it of course, it turned out to be faulty anyway, just not something that ultrasound could detect), but the nurse did show me the various parts of the insides of my stomachs on the screen.

Not that I could understand what the heck it was she was actually showing me though.

/Mike

 

[Max Knight]

I have not had one, but a friend of mine did, and it's a pretty funny story.

In college I was doing a lot of martial arts training (northern Shaolin style kung fu). Once during a sparing session my friend (let's call him "Bob") got clocked in the family jewels pretty hard. Well, the next day he noticed that things felt a little "wrong" with his package, and ended up going to the university hospital to get things checked out. He was told that the doctors would have to take an ultrasound of his sack to make sure that there was nothing broken in there.

So he's sitting on the table in his hospital gown, and a very beautiful young lady med-student comes into the room and introduces herself. Apparently she is going to be performing the ultrasound. Bob becomes worried that having this attractive lady poking around down will soon come face to face (so to speak) with the fact that he finds her very attractive. So Bob starts trying to think about anything but what's about to happen (which is of course impossible). So as she's getting the gel out to apply to the injured area, Bob thinks "hey, I'm in a hospital, at least the gel will be cold". But no, the gel is warm.

The inevitable happens. As the woman puts the warm ultrasound gel on him, Bob rises to attention. The woman just moves his unit out of the way and continues with the ultrasound, much to Bob's embarassment.

We teased Bob about this story all the time, and later find out that the story has been making the rounds in the med-school as well.

-Max

 

[Frederick]

I had one a few months ago. The doctor said that I was getting "abnormal results" on my blood test, and wanted to see if I had a gall stone or something. I was also having pains in my side. So I go in bright and early in the morning, get undressed and put on the robe. Fortunately she only made me take off my shirt. It is truely a strange experience. I was expecting the gel to be cold, but it was warm. VERY warm. She was showing me the different organs that she could see, and let me hear the blood flowing through one of them, my kidneys I think. She said that she could tell by the sounds if there was something wrong. Well, everything came up normal. No stones. My nutritionist advised me to cut out the fatty foods and eat more veggies. And despite all of my tests being ok (they've taken enough blood to create another person), I'm still getting "abnormal results" on my blood test. He's baffled. He says that there isn't anything wrong with me, but the tests show something "unusual" :rolleyes. The mystery continues ...
Freddy C.

 

[MickeS]

Max, a similar thing happened to a guy I worked with once. He said he was so damn embarrassed he didn't know what to do, but the nurse didn't seem too bothered by it. She said "Thank you" and went on with her business as usual.
/Mike

 

[Michael*K]

Freddy, I also only had to remove my shirt, which was good because that damned room was freezing. Maybe it used to be the morgue or they can't afford heat at the U. of C.
One thing that sort of unnerved me was that the technician/nurse asked me twice if I'd been feeling pain before I went there. I hadn't, but the fatalist in me wonders why she asked...Does it LOOK like I should be feeling pain???

 

[Mark Lee]

Micke -
Even after med school and residency training, I still haven't got the faintest idea what I'm seeing when I look at an ultrasound. (That's why there are radiologists for that sort of thing.) Personally, I think they're making it up half the time....
Max -
The same thing happened to a patient in the pediatric ward of one of the hospitals I rotated thru. A female attending physician was conducting morning rounds with the med students (us), and we were at the bedside of a teenage boy who was in for a workup of some problem with his testicles (testes testing? ). Anyway, the attending pulls back the gown, and lifts up the penis to expose the testes, and she continues to hold the penis while she's talking about the case. As she's talking, the already-uncomfortable kid's face is getting progressively more uncomfortable and red-faced, because his member, which has now been "in hand" for a good 2-3 minutes, is starting to....engorge.... All of us students are trying not to laugh (turning our heads when we feel a smile coming on), and the attending doesn't even notice until the boy's at full attention, at which point she hastily pulls the gown back down and flashes a brief embarrassed smile.

 

[Robert_J]

I had my ultra-sound to check for gall stones a few years ago. My memories of it are kind of blurry since I was on a demerol (sp?) drip for the pain. I do remember seeing a lot of very bright white spots on the screen. The next day they ran a tube down my throat all the way to my bile duct to suck out a stuck gall stone that was causing all of my pain. The day after that they removed my gall bladder. The doctor said it was completely full of stones.

-Robert

 

[Ken_McAlinden]

I had an ultrasound of my liver a few years back. I almost always test moderately high for one of the liver enzymes that can indicate a problem, so they wanted to check it out to make sure nothing was wrong. It is basically just an inherited trait from my Mom, and my liver was just as healthy as any other 80 year old alcoholic's (just kidding about that last part).

Darn that jelly was cold!

Regards,

 

[Brian Kissinger]

I've had several. Two years ago, I managed to get a lot of fluid in the sack that covers your heart. I had 2 before the "operation" (they stuck a giant fu**ing needle in my heart) and at least 4 or 5 afterwards. The gel was always warm for me, and the nurses were all very nice.
P.S. I didn't get any erections from it.:frowning:

 

[Tony G]

I had one of my kidneys a few months back...I had been passing some blood.
Mark,
I do TEE (transesophageal echocardiography) as part of cardiac anesthesia. To everyone else, that's where you stick an ultrasound probe down the esophagus and look at the heart. I found interpreting ultrasound pictures to be VERY hard to learn. Like many other things, it comes with experience
Back in the old days (and I'm not THAT old), I remember when there were no 3-D ultrasound pictures, just (seemingly)uninterpretable pictures of 2-D "maps" of where the sound waves all "bounced". I still see them when I go to talks about how TEE was in the "old days".
I think I'll go get some Geritol now.
Tony

 

[Michael*K]

It turns out the ultrasound tech either wasn't being straight with me or she doesn't know how to read the results. I guess the test didn't show any basketball sized tumors in my abdomen. However, it appeared my spleen was enlarged. Also, one of my kidneys didn't "light up" like it was supposed to.The latter could be the result of a bum scan. Also, on my bloodwork, one of my liver enzymes was slightly elevated. Since I rarely drink, they don't know what could be causing it. So I have to go in for a CAT scan, which I've never had. Maybe I need to start a new thread..."Anyone ever had a CAT scan before?"

 

[Allan Petersen]

I suffer from Crohn's disease, so I've had a few ultrascans. They are actually pretty fun compared to the horrors of endoscopy. *shudder*
Strangest thing is the fact that you get to see your own entrails FROM THE INSIDE! LIVE! ON COLOR TV!