Dexa Scan

The highlight of my day, possibly my week, was leaving the hospital this morning for an appointment at the Treatment Centre, all of a few hundred metres away! I was diagnosed with endometriosis last year after a scan on my bowels picked up an ovarian cyst. For those who don’t know what endometriosis is it’s where tissue similar to the lining of the womb grows in places it shouldn’t.

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/endometriosis/

I didn’t realise I had it because any pain below the waist I always attribute to my bowel problems. The gynaecology consultant said that they would normally carry out a laparoscopy (keyhole surgery) to formally diagnose and see the extent of the endometriosis but because of all my previous bowel surgeries this wasn’t an option. So the decision was made to give me Decaceptyl injections to put me into an early menopause. Doing this stops the womb lining from growing and from contracting when you have a period and therefore helps to reduce the pain. I have the injection once every 3 months and luckily I’ve not had any awful menopausal symptoms, touch wood! But an early menopause means you are at a greater risk of osteoporosis so I needed to go for a Dexa scan. This checks your bone density to see if you’re developing osteoporosis or you have any bone loss. 

The scan was at 8am so that meant I had to start and finish my TPN earlier and have my morning meds before I went. I even got dressed and it felt good not to be in pjs for once. I walked the 5 minutes from QMC to the treatment centre and after answering the now standard Covid questions I was taken into the scan room. 

The scanner was like a big bed and I thought it would take ages but it took less than 5 minutes. I didn’t get the results today, I will get them next time I go to clinic. Fingers crossed everything is ok.