Yackity Blog Blog

Today, I ate radioactive scrambled eggs with toast. No, it is not a figure of speech for eating a rotten egg, as my niece Christine thought that I was using. I went for a Gastric Emptying Study.

This medical procedure helps to evaluate how quickly food is emptied into the intestine. The test consists of eating scrambled eggs that have been mixed with a very small dose of radioactivity. Scans are then taken to see how much of the eggs remain in the stomach. Based on my readings on Gastric Emptying Study, when normal, it should indicate that usually about half should pass into the intestine within 90 minutes. Anything longer than 110 minutes implies poor gastric emptying function.

The procedure was very simple. I just laid on the examination table under the machine, which captured the images. I read my storybook in my Palm until Joseph came over to see how I was doing. So laying there for 90 minutes did not get boring. I could not see the monitor display while I laid there, so Joseph took pictures for me with my phone.

At one point, Joseph became tech support and worked with the technician because there was a software error. It scared me for a moment. I thought, I’d have to eat another egg and repeat the procedure. But, they just rebooted the machine and everything was fine. Yes, the wonders of reboot...

In the Nuclear Medicine department of the hospital, we were told that they are not famous for their cooking… They are a different kind of gourmet chefs. They may not be famous but they surely cook unforgettable radioactive scrambled eggs.