Once, some years ago, I was having some x-rays done for a urinary tract problem. I went through an entire series of tests only to determine that there was nothing wrong with my urethra or bladder. I was there at the radiology center to have the test done, and I was filling out the paperwork. You know the kind -- it asks if you have heart disease, liver problems, diabetes, and so on and so forth. In some places it can get quite specific, but in others it was very vague. Nowhere did it ask about surgery, or, specifically, abdominal surgery.
Now, I was there to have an x-ray of my abdomen, so one would think that the questionnaire would be a little more pointed in that regard. Of course, several years before I had had j-pouch surgery, which means that I no longer have a colon and my terminal ileum now serves as my "colon" of sorts. There was truly no place on the paperwork to describe this, so I just answered the questions and turned it in.
I'm escorted into the x-ray room and the technician takes the first film and looks at it. She then comes into the room looking puzzled and asks me, in her British accent, "Have you had some sort of surgery on your left side?"
"Why, yes," I replied, and I proceeded to describe my surgery and why I'd needed to have it. I told her -- the forms they gave me did not address abdominal surgery in any way, and no one asked me verbally.
She didn't seem very happy with my reply, but I thought the entire situation was funny, and I wonder if that little incident had any impact on the way they process patients at that particular radiology center. I'm sure she came away a little more knowledgeable about IBD and about j-pouch surgery.
Have you ever had a humorous experience tied to your IBD? Tell me about it!
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