What happens when you have a diffusion weighted scan?

[sanlou26]

Morning everyone,

I wonder if anyone can help?

I am due to have a diffusion weighted scan soon and I don't really know what it entails ( I forgot to ask the surgeon when I saw him). I know it is a sort of MRI scan that looks at the make up of the tumour (blood vessels, fluid, mass etc) and I assume I will have to have some sort of injection, like I did when I had my contrast MRI scans. Can anyone give me any more details? I have tried search engines and stuff and haven't found anything that spells it out in plain English. Lots about T1 and T2 weighted scans. Does anyone know if these are the same thing? To be fair I do get a bit depressed trawling through search engines! I always tend to find the worst cases.

Thank you, Sandra

[Dr Hungry]

I'm really sorry I can't be more helpful but I found this Wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diffusion-weighted_imaging which seems to suggest that the T2 weighted and diffusion weighted scans are the same thing, or are at least very similar processes. I don't actually have any experience of what you will have to go through as a patient thought. This website: http://www.answers.com/topic/magnetic-resonance-imaging about half way down talks about T2 weighted scans being different from a contrast MRI, so it might be that you don't have to have anything injected. I think essentially it will be very similar to having an MRI done but the machine might be doing some different things.

Sorry that I can't help more. All the best,

Neil

[sanlou26]

Hi Neil,

Thanks for all the trouble you must have gone too, to find out that information. It has helped a lot, thank you again,

Sandra