Tag: EEG

An EEG… at home.

Darren LongLeave a comment

It’s been awhile since I added an entry, huh? That’s okay, I have things to write about now. A few months ago, I visited the hospital where I received my brain surgery. In fact, back in December is when I visited and where I was told a Neurologists there wanted to “check” on me. “Just check”… is what I was told.

Well, I went to the University Hospital to get checked. Nothing special, I thought. They just wanted to check and see if I’m actually still alive. Right? Well, they saw me and spoke with me for awhile about a “test” they hadn’t done on me.

When they told me about an EEG, I said.. “EEG? I’ve done all those.” No reason to do it again. I fact, after a recent ambulance ride, I was given the chance to do an EEG. I did that one, and that was that.

I was assured that this EEG was one I hadn’t done before. This is because it’s only five years old and it’s done AT HOME.

Hmm… Guess I haven’t done THAT one before. I said, “Ok. BUT this is not a test to see if I would like the chance to do more surgeries.” The doctors agreed. Just a “newer” test I hadn’t done before. It was explained that a vehicle would come to the house and I would be set with the probes on my head… at my house. I don’t need to drive to the hospital. I don’t need to spend time in the hospital with probes on my head (already did that) and while laying in bed.

This was only a small difference from that. I stayed at home and DID NOT have to stay inside. No, just live at home (with 2 video cameras) and just see how it goes.

This testing was interesting. A guy came to my house on Sunday afternoon and set my head full of probes. THREE HOURS he was there. Talked me through the whole thing, and then started setting me up. Couple hours to put all those probes all over my head. Strung them all together and plugged them into a power box for me to carry. THEN, he had me lay in my bed and sleep for an hour. (Being a Sunday afternoon and just getting the probes stuck to my head, I couldn’t fall asleep…) With my head installed with the probes, and all of them connected to a power box that I had to carry, it was…..interesting.

This is about half-way through getting all those probes on my head.

This is the whole thing finished and what I wore. Button-up shirts is what I found to be easiest.

Tried to just live a normal life, but with all the probes on the head that were all wrapped in gauze, I decided that bike riding was out of the question. Bummer. So I just sat at home. Sunday… Monday… Tuesday… Then Wednesday afternoon came and the person was back at my house to take the probes from my head.

Ok, I didn’t just stay at home the entire time. I went to Walmart on two of the days for an hour, just to (honestly) see the way people would react. Most of them saw me, them quickly looked away. Very interesting situation. Had a couple different ladies talk to me all about it. They were interested.

Wednesday was no big deal, to me. But getting the probes and glue from my head? Takes some patience while washing my hair a couple times. (Still not entirely sure if I have it all out…)

And this is what I kept….

Just a bunch of wires and probes that were on my head. Along with the “white cover” over all of it.

No idea what they’ll learn. I, personally, am sure that I am not getting another surgery. Now, I’m NOT saying this brain surgery I had isn’t worth the testing and work for all people to get, that need it. I do know about others where this surgery HAS been successful. Keep an open mind and learn all you can.

BRAIN…

Darren Long1 Comment

I’ve started seeing a new Neurologist recently over at Kansas University Med (KU Med). She seems very nice and seems to know what she’s talking about. I was, as per her suggestion, going to get a VNS implant into my shoulder to help with the seizures that I have had all my life and have gone through every type of Epileptic medication there is. I suggested to her that I get a MRI and EEG first just for us to see the status of my brain. So, on Valentines Day, I got to go back to KU Med to do the lovely two tests for the celebrations of the holiday 🙂 to check everything out. Few weeks later I met with the new doc and she told me that from the looks of my messed up brain (not the exact words she used), doing the VNS implant is off the table.

Now she is talking about full-on brain surgery (Temporal Lobe Resection) to cut away the “bad” parts of my brain. This is going to entail a few more tests first. The first one on March 29th, is similar to what would be called a cognitive test (forget the official name). This is an all day test up at KU Med. A week away from now. I’ll have to let you how all that went afterwards. Then after that, on April 8th I get to start a Seven-Day Video EEG. Seven days stuck in a hospital room. I’m either in the bed, in a chair or visiting the bathroom. No showers. No baths (maybe a sponge-bath done by a pretty college girl ).  Visiting the bathroom is the only time I will be without video cameras watching me all the time. Can’t sleep under sheets and have I must have the lights on while I sleep just so that the video camera will watch me constantly. Arg!

Also as part of the Video EEG is the taking me off my meds and a lack of sleep. I’m sure this will cause me to have a few seizures with those things happening (or lack of happening). I’ve read about people doing these EEG’s and the doctors are looking for the outcome from a certain type of seizure. These people were only having grand-mal seizures, and that’s not what they needed. So, they had to do the Video EEG multiple times.

One more test… SPECT Brain Imaging. This is a 2 hour test that entails the injection a radiopharmaceutical (radio-active) one hour before imaging begins. The imaging is done with me laying down and a “camera” revolving around my head taking 3D images of my brain. The injection of the radio-active stuff shows the blood flow around the brain. After seeing this, the doctors can recognize the areas of the brain that are being used the most and which is used the least

I’ve heard and read that these rooms are pretty nice with a cool TV, fridge and other things. Kinda like a hotel room. Hope I can take my cell phone so I can chat with people while I’m there and brag about what they are missing. ha ha…  I’ll take pictures later when I get in there to show everyone myself and my cool room. I’ll let everyone know how the test next Friday went.

A couple links:

SPECT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-photon_emission_computed_tomography

Video EEG: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long-term_video-EEG_monitoring

MRI: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_resonance_imaging