Lost in space

• CT scan of my chest, abdomen and pelvis at Barnes West County Hospital

I’m not sure why my scans have been scheduled at the hospital lately and not at the Imaging Center. At the Imaging Center, they check me in with lots of “hi sweetie!”s, “how are you hunny?” and “good morning beautiful”s. I know most of the nurses who can access my port and I know the CT tech by name and they all get me in and out pretty quickly.

At the hospital, CT patients are all blended in with other outpatient patients. I get a pager, there’s the check-in process (insurance) and then waiting for the pager to go off. It’s normally a pleasant process, I know several of the nurses now and even some of the CT techs who say hi to me by name in the hallways.

My sister Sharon is in town to take me to this appointment and we get settled in the chairs with our pager. I have a hard time sitting upright for very long so at some point I explained to Sharon that I was struggling with pain, so we laid me across some seats. It was crowded so I felt like a real seat hog! I wasn’t getting called for registration but sometimes for scans I am pre-registered. Plus there are signs all over, please be patient, we’ll be right with you, etc. so I don’t stress about it. However an hour goes by, I’m extremely uncomfortable and Sharon is losing her patience. She talks to a couple clerks only to discover that I never made it into the check-in queue after I got my pager. I’m lost in computer land. We would have sat there for hours waiting. Thank goodness Sharon was less patient than me. From there, check-in and the CT took no time at all. Especially since my aide was practicing for some kind of wheelchair races. #zoom #excuseus