General Chat

Lots of big squishy hugs for Janey - 'cos I know you love it:-)))

S x

All the best for tomorrow, Janey.

Gwynne

Best wishes Janey

Hope everything goes well which I am sure it will

Janey, I knew there was a higher power that made me choose this week to go away for a few days sans PC ;)

But really, best of luck with it .

xx

Dear diary ... I have just drunk my first 5-ounce concoction. So far, it's making me a teeny bit queasy and made me burp ...

To stave off the horrified outcries against what might come next -- fear not. I shall put a lock on the diary. ;)

Bob, and speaking of holding hands ... mine got held by No.1 as they attempted twice to catheterize him during his first bout of diabetic ketoacidosis near-death last year. Numb for a week, I was. When it happened all over again three days later, I told them not even to try trying that. And I made sure they slapped a patch on him asap, too. ;) And then I got to have my hand held by him as the nurse tried 8 times to get an IV in him when he was in for the retinal detachment in July ... He looks so skinny and fragile!

I'm due for my first dose in about 2 hours. Better get some work done now I think!

Margot, maybe it's changed since last time, check it out! I know this is a whole lot simpler than when I had to walk the old African gent through it a few years ago.

Hmmm

so if the camera is about a 5mm diameter? as big as a biro.......also similar size is the one for a male bladder /prostate inspection...........after having one of those...... I know which orifice I would prefer inspected.....Bob

but lets hope it goes well, Janey

You only have to drink half a cup of the stuff twice?? Lucky you!

I'm overdue to have another one,but the thought of getting down 4 litres of that yukky stuff is stopping me from making an appointment.I suppose I will have to force myself!

All the best for for Tuesday.Let us know how you fare.... I'm sure everything will be fine. Margot.

I didn't make that up, Ginny! Just copied and pasted from the New England Journal of Medicine 1995 -- my dad is famous, you see; he's the "alert cheerful man". ;)

Like father like daughter ...

I do expect to be fine, Irene -- it's the doctors and their henchpeople I fear for!

JC....leave some bl##dy white space please, oh, and some thinking space too ;)

Just take the ring and a bucket ;)

God luck Janey - show them what a Canuck is made of

You will be fine I am positive


Renes

*sniggers lol*
x

Glenys! Glenys! Glenys! Once a week I think to myself: I must email Glenys and ask how things go! And then I don't!

I wonder whether anybody ever figured out our little adventure ... or anybody cared ...

~waves to Janey~
Hello, Stranger! Haven't been here for a while; hope the procedure doesn't leave you uncomfortable. *winces lol*
Must catch up; will explain via pm.
x

that's my perfect and entirely logical excuse for being a wimp then!

My dad's written up in the New England Journal of Medicine!

He was the first reported case. There have been many since then. The injury - a brain bleed - is caused by sheering, from the violent movements, rather than by a blow. There have been efforts in the US (he was injured at Cedar Point in Ohio, a famous amusement park) to control the operators of these things (like Disney, where one such injury happened a few years ago), but the congressperson leading the charge has had no success, because of their economic power.

[edited to add white space ;) ]

http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199506083322317

Roller-Coaster Headache

N Engl J Med 1995; 332:1585June 8, 1995

To the Editor:

We report a case of subdural hematoma caused by riding on a roller coaster.

A 64-year-old man presented to our neurology clinic with a 10-week history of headache. He was healthy, apart from hypertension controlled by triamterene (Dyazide) and hydrochlorothiazide. He had not previously had headaches.

The headaches developed gradually after he began riding a roller coaster at an amusement park. The roller coaster, he reported, “swings people upside down as many as six times.” During the ride his head was enclosed within bars that kept him stable in a chair, and there was never direct trauma to his head. He rode the roller coaster on 11 different occasions [he didn't; 11 *different roller coasters*] until his headaches became so severe that he was unable to continue.

Nevertheless, the headaches continued to worsen. They were worsened by shaking the head but not by coughing or sneezing, nor were they accompanied by nausea or vomiting. The headaches were located mainly over the left side of the head. They did not awaken him at night but tended to develop at about 10 a.m., after he had been up for about two hours. There were no other neurologic symptoms.

Examination disclosed an alert, cheerful man of normal body build whose neurologic examination, including testing of mental status, was normal.

A computerized tomographic (CT) scan of the head showed a left-sided subdural hematoma, 8 mm in depth, with a mild midline shift. It was decided to treat the patient conservatively. However, a second CT scan two weeks later showed that the depth of the hematoma had increased to 10 mm

(Figure 1
Figure 1A
CT Scan of the Head with Contrast Enhancement, Showing a Left-Sided Subdural Hematoma (Arrow) that Caused a Mild Shift of Midline Structures and Compression of the Adjacent Cerebral Hemisphere.).

Thus, neurosurgery was performed, with successful evacuation of the hematoma. The patient had an excellent postoperative course. [Well, except for the emergency surgery for Crohn's disease!]

This patient's subdural hematoma and resulting headaches occurred in association with riding a roller coaster. The swooping ride induces marked rotatory and other positional changes in a deformable brain that is moving within a relatively rigid skull, thus causing tensile and shearing stresses.

Cortical veins, as they enter the more fixed portions of the dural sinuses, tear, thus causing subdural hematomas. **Such an event is a recognized occurrence in the shaken-baby syndrome.**[1,2]

Ommaya and Yarnell[3] described a 62-year-old man who had a subdural hematoma and headache after a whiplash injury in which, as in our patient, there was no direct trauma to the head.

Patients in whom headaches develop for the first time in association with events that cause violent movement of the head, such as a ride on a roller coaster, even though there is no direct trauma to the skull, may have subdural hematoma.

A CT or magnetic resonance imaging scan of the head should be performed on an emergency basis.

[They didn't do one on my dad until my mum threatened to go sit in the Emergency Room until *they* did one, actually.]

Y. Bo-Abbas, M.D.
C.F. Bolton, M.D.
Victoria Hospital, London, ON N6A 4G5, Canada

3 References

1 Teyssier G, Rayet I, Miguet D, Damon G, Freycon F. Hémorragie cérébro-méningée du nourrisson: enfants secoués [shaken babies]? Sévices ou accident? Trois observations. Pediatrie 1988;43:535-538
2 Thyen U, Tegtmeyer FK. Das Schütteltrauma des Säuglings -- eine besondere Form der Kindesmisshandlung. Monatsschr Kinderheilkd 1991;139:292-296
3 Ommaya AK, Yarnell P. Subdural haematoma after whiplash injury. Lancet 1969;2:237-239


and they've since been cited in all the other reported cases.


Remember where I ran away to with No.2 a year ago? Yup, the land of mighty roller coasters ... ;)

sorry Janey I just have to interrupt for a minute...something you said!

Your dad had 'shaken baby syndrome' from a roller coaster ride? I had not thought of that...it's not something I am wanting to do, but with family medical history I would certainly think twice after reading that, I might have been tempted if i went somewhere with son.

thanks for that :))

Janey,Hope all goes well and you dont suffer too much.Hopefully all will be clear. Annie

Here I am!

Just been and bought the vile stuff. At least it wasn't expensive (got the generic, $15). And made myself a big batch of peach jello, a package I've had around for years. I hope I like it ...

Everybody's is different it seems! Margot -- glad to hear your good result -- I only have to drink 1/2 cup of the stuff, twice. I know when I walked the elderly African gent through his about 5 years ago, it meant having him call me every hour so I could tell him what to drink/eat (jello) next. My instructions seem simpler:
- tiny breakfast Monday, only clear fluids from then til Tuesday afternoon procedure;
- one packet / half cup of stuff at suppertime Monday, another 6 am Tuesday.
I love that idea. Wake up at 6 am, not my preference, and be afraid to go back to sleep ...

Gwyn -- my mum showed up for her precautionary colonoscopy not long after my sister's cancer was diagnosed, and the doctor decided that since she hadn't had some barium procedure already, he wouldn't do it. My mum reacted very badly to a barium thing once before and won't do it again. So it was a stalemate, and she hasn't had a colonoscopy.

Libby, Katherine - dads and Crohn's - my dad was diagnosed with Crohn's when he was about 65. He was recuperating from having a hole drilled in his head to drain the subdural haematoma (bleeding) from the shaken-baby injury he got on a roller coaster. Two days after surgery, his digestion shut down, his belly swelled up, they quickly sent him to ER to get cut open, and did an abdominal bypass, no prep. One doctor met another on the elevator late that night. Mr Canuck is doing fine, the surgeon said to the neurosurgeon. I know, said the neurosurgeon, I saw him this morning. Nooo, said the surgeon, I just operated on him and he has Crohn's disease, removed two feet of intestine! My dad had had heartburn and such all his life (and an ulcer), but nobody ever knew. And he was fine after.

Me, I'm the atypical Virgo -- a total slob and a cast-iron digestion. But bad genes all over the famn damily still.

I do have a feeling, though, that what I'll want to eat on Tuesday evening won't be the chicken, spinach, squash and cauliflower confection (high-fibre, fresh veg!) I'm going to make tomorrow, for consumption later in the week ... with the extreeemely hot left-over curry sauce I made a while ago and just found in the freezer. ;)

I'm told I won't be asleep. The nurse on the phone just didn't give me satisfactory answers on the sedation part, other than mumbling about demerol. This part remains to be dealt with on the day.

As for holding hands -- I had a procedure many years ago that was unspeakably painful (didn't know at the time how hard to sedate/anaesthetize I am) and a nurse was there to give me her hand. I got hold of her upper arm instead, and I expect she claimed worker's comp after that! I must have got the idea from an old friend who did exactly that to me when I birth-coached her. ;)


The rest of you now ... you're just rude. ;)