As you might remember I had a CT scan done in November of my liver as follow up of the MRI I had in July last year. The MRI had showed two cysts in my liver but the PET scan had rule out they were cancer. In November they confirmed that both cysts were categorised as Hemangiomas, meaning no cancer but they suggested a follow up 6 months later to make sure that was the case. So on my last Herceptin treatment Dr Chen said she wanted to do another CT scan of the liver and the regular MUGA scan of my heart to make sure my heart is not affected by Herceptin.
The hospital called me two days later to set up the appointment, I was doubting to do both scans at the same time or split them in two days but she was really good on setting them up one after another and she kind of convinced me to go ahead and just do both the same day. The problem was when she said I had to go to the hospital earlier than the scan to pick up the bottles to drink before the scan, I was horrified, my last CT scan was just contract through an IV and not drinking but this one was drinking and IV so I freak out. I asked why I was having a different scan than last time and she said I had to speak to my doctor but she had requested a full abdomen and pelvis scan, of course my mind started wondering why she is requesting a bigger scan if there is no reason to do it....When I finished talking to the hospital I called my doctor office as a paranoid woman that I am in this cases to ask why they were doing a much bigger scan, they just said that they thought that was what they had done last time so they kind of told me to calm down and get along with it.
I did both scans last Friday, for the CT scan you have to drink lots of horrible who knows what....first bottle has to be taken 4 hours before, another one 1 hour before and the last one while I was there. They put an IV where injected the dye that makes you so hot that the hot flashes from Tamoxifen are nothing compare to it. The CT scan is finished really fast, you are in and out in 5 minutes.
After the CT scan I had the MUGA scan that takes about an hour as they take blood out, they mix it with some radioactive thing they let it stay for half an hour, they inject it back to you and they put you in the scan. The scan last around 25 min and it is a bit of a pain as they connect you to all this sensors to your heart and the only thing you can hear around you are beeps. Also the screen on the top comes really close to you and it is much more claustrophobic than the CT scan. The technician told me that the results were really similar to last scan so meaning they were good.I have to say that I love my Dr as she calls me as soon as she sees the result which is normally 24 to 48 hours later. She did called me on Tuesday and told me that the scan was all clear in all the areas, that I still have got the same cysts in the liver that have not changed and that they are categorizing it as non cancer. She told me that she will not do another CT scan on me but probably do annual ultrasound of my liver. She had not received the results from the MUGA but told her that I was ok to wait until Monday on my Herceptin treatment to get it as the technician had already told me it was fine.
I had my year check up with the breast surgeon today and everything was great!, another milestone to celebrate, have got only 6 sessions of Herceptin to go, a surgery and that is it!!. I still see every doctor every 3 months but I prefer to do that than non seeing them at all, call it peace of mind that everything is ok.
