Monday, February 23, 2009

Anyone for an angiogram?

It's amazing what a retinal angiogram will do for your piss.

At the Eye & Ear Hospital today, a tube was stuck in my arm through which yellow dye is injected. Retinal photographs were then taken to track the blood flow in the retinal blood vessels. It seems I may have a mild form of a rare condition, Purtscher's retinopathy, but that's yet to be confirmed.

The retinal photography I was subjected to (by Andrew Newton, a fabulous underwater photographer in his spare time - check out his snaps in the waiting room on level 4) had me seeing everything in brilliant shades of pink as fluorescent as my urine, with shadows in fluoro blue. Damn weird shit (no pun intended).

I did something very silly and rode my motor scooter to my appointment. Check out my pupils. Next time I'll take the taxi; it was a real struggle to get home.

Can you see a slight yellow tinge to my skin? That's the yellow dye. I was warned it could have been much stronger.

On the subject of medical appointments (and believe me, I'm having heaps of these), I was at the Mercy Hospital in East Melbourne for a dawn MRI scan of my shoulder last week when a couple of high-fliers drifted past. I always have a camera with me and grabbed these snaps. Amazingly, both my camera and my mobile phone, in different pockets of my motorcycle jacket, were unscratched in my recent accident.

In case you're not aware, any of the above images can be clicked on to see a larger version.

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