what do they do when they do a catscan for seizures?

Question

I am just curious as I have a apt at noon, and I am kinda stressing over it as I had one done when I was really little, but I forget what they did. Can anyone tell me? I believe its to check for epilepsy is what they are doing...

Answer 1

A CAT scan for seizures is quite a simple procedure. It is essentially a CAT scan or CT scan of the brain.

You turn up for your appointment - do a little bit of paperwork - then you get brought to the scanner and you lie on the gantry.

The gantry moves.

The scanner whirs a bit

Then it's over and out you come.

See the wiki page about CAT scans. There are some pictures of what the scanner looks like. These days we don't have the long tunnel anymore. It's more of a sort of big plastic and metal donut which the gantry (the narrow bed) goes through the middle of.

In the CAT scan for epilepsy, they are particularly looking to see if you have a "structural abnormality" of your brain - ie. if you have brain cancer or a scar from an old accident or maybe a stroke or something (or if you just grew wierd) and have a thing there they can see that might be causing the seizures. In young people with epilepsy the most common result is a normal CAT scan.

I hope Jewel wasn't making reference to Cliffy B's Cat Scan page where they put their pet cat on their computer scanner and send Cliffy a picture! I can't seem to find it any more so I think animal rights groups must have closed him down ... or pulled his power cord or something :-)

Answer 2

Computerized tomography x-rays are no big deal, when done without contrast. Yours may be ordered with contrast, which has a risk of adverse events, but that risk is only 1 in about 200,000, so really it's not something to be stressed about. You go in, fill out the usual ream of forms, lie on the table, and the machine moves the table and you to put your entire brain through the plane of the directed x-ray beams. If yours is ordered with contrast, they may get intravenous access with a catheter just like the usual IV's you see all the time, and the contrast material is injected into a vein. You may get a little flushed sensation, and a coppery taste in your mouth, but probably not much else, and they scan you again. The scan itself takes only minutes. All the paperwork, sit-and-wait, and administrative stuff will take maybe a couple of hours. They're doing it not for epilepsy but to make sure there are no big structural abnormalities that might be causing the seizures.

Answer 3

My cat has epilepsy, take your cat to the vet, mine had a seizure in the vet's hospital, she's on medication now, I have to give her Phenobarbital 15 mg. one half in the morning & half in the evening, she'e doing just fine, its not too expensive in Canada it's about $40.00 for 150 pills that's enought for 300 days. I hope you talking about your cat ,your wording isn't too clear.