Show me your MRI i'll show you mine
 

Friend of mine had heat stroke multiple times. This one he hasn't come out of yet and it's been 3+ months. It's effected his mood, anxiety, hands shake at times. This is his & mine compared. I have MS.

edit - notice his brain shrinkage vs mine + center enlarging, also uploaded larger image

Was searching for possible ccsvi issues in me. At least I learned how to make pretty pictures which my dr's enjoy. Makes for good Ty infusion show & tell.

My Lesions
 

White spots are what to look for on this type of (don't know correct term), filter.
I believe the 1st post is Alzheimer's in my friend's brain.

I have never seen my MRIs.:confused:

Me, father, my friend
 

In that order from top to bottom. The center can enlarge with age I believe. Notice mine's smallest, father's medium, friend's largest. Shouldn't be that way.
Sally, i'm shocked to hear you say that! Get your mri's on cd and i'll give a "how to" instruction when I can. How bout you all do it and let's "see" our disease.
I'm good with CT's & PET's as well, will upload some soon.

.. I have only seen my MRI while at the 3 Neuro Visits.

I would love to be able to view them at home. However i have tried to look at them but they seem to Not be compatable with my Mac Book Pro (Apple) computer..:confused:

Search DICOM Mac

A few CT's for 10/11/12
 

All from the same CT scan, was changing opacity settings after creating 3D model. You all should get your scans on cd and play. It's quite entertaining.

Looks like a ham or chicken in one..lol:eek:

A day late but..
 

Happy Halloween. Thin slice MRI which is why it's smooth, no steps. More slices per inch. Me playing with opacitiy settings trying to see veins. Brain MR's always stop a couple vert's to high to see what I want.

2012 vs 2013 MR Brain
 

As you can see, lesion(s) haven't changed much here yet numbness in hands, mouth, arms, small muscle twitches approx 4" in length & 1/4" wide on diff parts of my bod keep growing.

I wish you all would get your MR's on cd, learn this program & post photos for us all to learn/compare.
Many neuros just read report written by radiologist which, read your own sometime & see why i'm stressing we all do this.

Using free Onis software which is the best i've found & the only that allows importing images/series/studies from multiple cd's. That's key right there.

I'll post instructions when needed.

Speaking of MRI's, I am scheduled for a brain and spine MRI. Doctor states that it will be WITHOUT contrast. Is is better to to both? With and without contrast?

Koi, asked my neuro if I could have ONLY contrast cause they're the images I use for seeing lesions & w/o images don't do much for me and, why pay extra and spend extra time if w/o doesn't help me much? He told me contrast shows active lesions, w/o shows old. Don't take that as gospel cause I didn't research it. Certainly demand w & w/o if you're not allergic to dye.

My avatar (look left) IS however made from w/o contrast slices since they only thin sliced w/o. I was excited to get my 2013 MR last week thin sliced w w/o contrast but the typical bleep'n know it all tech said "we follow MS protocol", which turned out to be regular slices. Called asking if they forgot to put thin slice series on cd (as they have in past) and she said no. Dr has to call, they went by script. I asked "so what should he write? thinner slices?" Thin slice boxes were checked, guess that wasn't clear enough.

Looks like my MRI is going to be without contrast as per the doctors request. Is it really claustrophobic inside that tube? I was told it takes 25 minutes inside. Is it loud inside? Hopefully they pipe some music in there to keep me occupied...:D

So if my insurance is approving an MRI should I fight to get it with and without contrast because they might not allow a second MRI so I would rather get the proper MRI done the first time.

In section F, I see two more spots on the right side. Sometime, I'll have to get around to deleting the information off of mine, I'd like to share a couple of images.
Looking at brains, intrigues me, sometimes. Sometimes there's some scary stuff...there's this online Harvard site, that displays all kinds of illnesses in photographs. Have you seen it?

Hope you don't mind my jumping in on this conversation, Koi, why wouldn't your neurologist request the GAD contrast test. All they have to do, is pull you out of the tube before the last 15 minutes, inject the dye and push you back in, and voila. To me, the contrast testing is important, then again, what do I know? Just a MS patient, not a doctor.

To some, it's claustrophobic, to some, it's not. Depends, are you the type of person that can relax and remain calm and cope with the time it takes to just lay still? The banging noise, is loud. My first round, the hospital that conducted the MRI's did have music. The hospital that I had MRI's at, since, does not. There is a break in the noise, as they maneuver the angles.

I usually find myself dozing off, even with the loud noise.

A few more to follow...

Pardon my descriptions, for I care to study lesions, not terminology.
Yes there are many tiny lesions not shown cause I wanted more views, taking up real estate.

How anyone with MS effects, takes MS meds, gets mr's, and doesn't study his/her own brain, how or if the drugs are working (not always though), to find proof of remission or progression is beyond me.

Personal data text on image goes away with a click of the "A' icon in Merge software, in Onis it's located in drop down menu.
Only text i wipe in photoshop is last name prior to first shown up top which mr software doesn't.

OK, I don't have photoshop, but I think I have something I can wipe out just my name/personal info...

I'll share since you've shared yours. Just give me a couple of days :D

2006 2009 2010
 

White spots of any size, white edges around my hollowing center are ng.

2011 2012 2013
 

Once again, look for white spots, edges. Same applies to all you.

with/without contrast
 

Tell me if i'm wrong. I believe this is w w/o difference.

cervical
 

Tough looking for lesions on cord, posting these to show my C7 99% complete cord cut from accident 20+ yrs ago. Notice spinal cord shrinks like the wicked witch's feet over time.
I called injury C6.5 to a neuro. He laughed like I was an idiot. He was my neuro for 45 minutes & told his front desk what he is. Only regret was not telling him & no, idiot wasn't word spoke.

Posting MRI's... Good idea! My last MRI was in 2003 - I just got copies of the film at that time.

Tom

I can see them. I'll let you know when mine are up. May just post them, in my profile.

Here's one
 

This is from the MRI, that led to my final DX, in 2007. I added some to my profile album, and will share a couple more on this thread, but the rest will be there.

I misplaced my 2008's and 2009's. But did upload some from 2010 and 2011. I haven't had an MRI, since 2011.

http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/pi...pictureid=7463http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/pi...pictureid=7480http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/pi...pictureid=7479http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/pi...pictureid=7476

The 2nd and 3rd are from 2/2011 and the last is from 3/2010. I edited this into this post, to save thread space and group it altogether.

I used IRFanview to edit my information.

Wow thank you for letting me see another's brain on MS. 1st photo sure shows lesions. I have 1 or 2 that size, mostly smaller ones. Spinal cord can't see due to size but that's what T1 area? My cord's sliced approx 2 verts higher. You take meds?

That could be my T1 area, not sure. The last one, I feel, looks like it's the black spots, as the whole color scheme on that MRI looks contrast? Not sure.

I just grabbed a bunch of photos from my MRI CD. I don't have any reports to look at, to know what areas, etc, I am looking at.

No, I am not on meds right now. It was Tysabri, as my next step. Couldn't tolerate the Copaxone shots(my 1st med), the site reactions were really a pain. My body rejected interfurons(Avonex), rather quickly.

The thought of the rebound effect and the fact that it's usually only for 2 years, and not even being 40...I just cannot bring myself to that final medicine.

I'm just keeping myself active, watching my diet, more for weight control, since when I gain weight I have back problems.

Otherwise, all I can do is cross my fingers, pray, and work on stress control.


to add: the third one, in relation to the other photos around it, on my MRI, those white spots look like lit up lesions. it was one of those photos that they were adjusting the view of the brain...as the shots go from whole to partial to all those various shots on the mri. leading up to that one membrane looking photo, before they angle to another area.((best way I know how to describe looking at these MRI's...because I am certainly not in the medical field to know how to describe why they take photos of the areas that they do, in an MRI))

How did you end up getting CT's and PETs of your brain? It's never been mentioned to me, before, about MS.

PET was not of brain, CT of brain is/was used for quick check from the neck up when I fell backwards going down poorly designed boardwalk ramp. You don't want ct's or pet's cause its radiation & mri's better.

2006 Left 2013 Right

2006 Left 2013 continued. Contrast could've been pumped up but I didn't. You'll still see lesions big & small.

1st thing I did (last photo in this post) is rotate the 3 views using 3D mode tool to straighten my head tilts cause the techs that put you/me in machine don't, go figure.

You can drag/drop all 10 full size images to your pc & view in slide show mode.

Different settings mri machine used
 

The first 2 in each image look to be without contrast, the last has "dark fluid" in description bar so, that's easy. Notice the huge difference how light/white areas show vs no contrast. I'd never get a mri w/o contrast unless I was deathly allergic to it.

I can see them, more clearly in the 3rd pic of each group, especially the fourth group. Thanks for sharing. Haven't had much chance to look for the missing two years of cds. I know they are around..just where :D

Very good
 

I like this idea.

I haven't got a copy of my results but I will request them.

I have initial MRI nearly a year ago, then about 6 months later, one with contrast and one without. I will get the CDs and upload when I can.

Slightly off topic but I also have an MRI of a fish... long story...

Diagnosis
 

Well my friend who i started this about (maybe? it's been a while) was driven 4hrs away to see a specialist. His diagnosis is Parkinsonism Syndrome from that doc. It sure looked like parkinsons or alzheimers to me by his films & shakes. A few months ago his local put him on a alzheimers med & he did stabilize, told him if a med can do that, be thankful. Look at us with MS.

This really hurts but here it is...

http://home.ix.netcom.com/~jdalton/033.mpg

jackD

Interesting. Looks like you combined same slice/level from different scans over time/yrs to show lesions come & go. I'll have to try that since I had scans almost every yr from 2006 to 2013.

I've never had much interest in my MRIs except that I have a folder of them somewhere, and I'm supposed to tote them along to any doctor who needs to have them. The present neuro has more recent ones on a CD.

I did pull them out once out of curiosity but realized I'd never begin to understand them, and so they're back on a shelf somewhere gathering dust.

Last time I saw the neuro he pulled up a couple of views on the screen so he could show me the brain shrinkage he was talking about.

Somehow I didn't much want to hear about that.:eek:

I always look at the CDs but don't understand them. My current neuro had a new set taken recently and didn't comment about the results but said I am mild to moderate with the MS.

I look at them and see some white spots and there were a bit more this last time.