Lumbar Special

I could not believe it, I went in on Wednesday last week and we had a whole day schedule full of Lumbar exams. Well needless to say I have maxed my required 10 Lumbar exams needed for the ASRT. Oh well it really built my confidence in that I can do a good Lumbar exam. We did have a few patients that we had to give contrast to due to having previous surgery and a few really messed up backs, all and all it went pretty smoothly.

Friday I was able to scan my first breast exam, with allot of help. I really think these exams are interesting. All though this one was strange because the patient had found a small pea size lump on her right breast through self examination in late September and recently had a previous mammo study in July, that had not detected anything. The tech stated the Doctor should of ordered an ultrasound first before the MRI, that is usually the way the routine of tests are scheduled. Anyway we did the MRI second and are waiting to see if the Radiologist can detect anything. We couldn't see anything that jumped out at us. Hopefully it will be nothing more than a clogged duct or cyst. I also have been observing the mammo exams when we are not busy. I think this is an area I would like to get into in the future. I am going to try to go to the week mammo conference this April, however I don't have any idea where I can get my clinicals done. Oh well I will figure it out, where there is a will there is a way. Well I will post more later, hopefully this week I will be able to get another comp and have a variety of scans instead of all Lumbars.

Scanning On My Own!!!!!!!!!

Well I was able to get comp number two this last week and allot more scans for the ASRT required list. I am starting to get the hang of it finally but still need help. I am able to do a few scans pretty much by myself and the techs just leave me alone unless I ask for help. I am starting to feel like a real MRI tech. The most recent exams I have been doing by myself are the shoulder exams. The clinic site that I am at seems to do allot of shoulders, lumbars, and knees. I imagine that this is very dependent on the type of environment and geographic area the clinic is set in. Crawfordsville is very much a factory town and we probably get allot of shoulders due to repetitive movement due to the work, along with knees and lumbars because people are standing on cement all day long. I never really thought about MRI in this way before. Anyway we have had to turn quite a few people away and send them to an open site due to their shoulder size and not being able to fit into the bore. Allot of the people comming in for shoulders cannot raise their other arm over their head either due to problems with both shoulders or previous surgery on the opposite shoulder.

Next week I checked the schedule and we have several exams that we don't get allot of breasts, feet, and a couple of abdomens. I think I am going to try to arrange my clinic days to be able to observe these exams. I figure I am going to have to get out into my first job before I will be able to get all the exams that are needed to be able to sit for the boards. This is really starting to worry me due to the lack of jobs in this field. Hopefully the job drought will give by the time we all are ready to get out in the field we have chosen. Hope everyone has a good weekend, post more later.