Any experience of mri in a young child?

[fifitot]

DD has to have one. She is 2. I am stressed out at the moment about what ifs regarding her issues so don't want to go into details suffice to say she needs a scan.

I know she will need sedation but any experience? The worst bit will be waiting for results. How long does it take???

Help.

My Ds1 had one done at 2, one done at 4 and one done at 5. DD1 had one at 13 months and one at 2, DD2 had one done at a week old. Ds1 and DD1 have cerebral palsy and the hospital thought it could be a genetic disorder which progesses so thats why they had so many. Dd2's was done because I requested it, as she was premature and because of Ds1 and Dd1's CP.

Anyway, the nurse will give you a syrine of sedation meds, and you will be left in a quiet room, until she falls asleep. They will then take her to the MRI machine, you can normally go in with her, and will be given industuiral (sp?) earmuffs to protect your ears (its still loud even with them on) A nurse maybe with you or will obverse her from outside.

The results can be back within a week (dd1's were back within a week, I phoned up for the results) or the hospital may make you an appointment a month or so later (depends what hospital she is at)

DS1 was scanned at about 18 mths & the experience is far more stressful for the carer than the patient! I volunteered to go to the room with him and wished I'd opted to stay and watch the screens 'cos frankly sitting in a room with a sleeping child is pretty dull and once you were in you were in. The machine was quite noisy but as the child is out of it it's only you that might be bothered. He was a little woozy coming round but nothing that wasn't slept off within a day or so.

My experience will be different as DD was only two weeks old when she had hers. Because she was so young they didn't sedate her and she slept through a lot of it. It is noisy and it seemed to me to go on a long time but I think that was partly just that there was nothing that I could do, as fiplus said. I sat down on a chair at the far side of the room at one point because I was feeling too nervous watching as they had said DD could have it without sedation if she stayed still so I had been watching for movement. I think it actually was only twenty minutes or something like that. And we got a phone call from the surgeon after about five days ish I think with the results.

My DS had one at 12 months, I held him in my arms while they gave him the gas, by far the worst bit as he struggled a lot, then they took him, I gave him a kiss and we went back to the recovery room to wait. They called us back 20 mins or so later as he started to come around. He was very very very cross, so cross he wouldn't eat and they were reluctant to let us go home until he had had something. Eventually he had a little bit and we left, he fell fast asleep in the car which was just what he needed. He seemed to have no ill effects after that.
The consultant rang us up after about a week with the results. We pretty much knew that he had CP anyway so this was more of a formality and definitive diagnosis so waiting for the results was not too difficult.
Hope it goes well.

Thanks ladies.