The Advice Doctor

Dear Advice Doctor,

We’re having our 25-year high school reunion next month, and I would like to get your opinion on using these temporary topical creams that I’ve seen advertised about eight thousand times. Naturally I want to look like the very picture of health, but I don’t want to look made up or fake either. What option do you think would be best?

Dear Looking Back,

— Looking Back (to my younger days)

I definitely understand where you’re coming from. There are quite a few options, but each one has a specific application. Naturally, you want the one that will provide others with the best possible view.

The simplest method, of course, would be x-rays. They are quick, easy, painless, and very effective for finding things that might be abnormal, like a broken bone or a tumor.

A close relative of x-rays (although it might not seem like it) are CT scans. While an x-ray is simply an image, a CT scan combines multiple x-rays to create a slice of the body, a cross section, for more detailed imaging and more accurate diagnoses where a single x-ray is not sufficient.

Next up is Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). As with CT scans, you will lie on a table that slides into the circular opening of the machine. In this case a powerful magnet circles around the tunnel opening, and the magnetic fields and radio waves used are translated into a very detailed image that can diagnose aneurysms, strokes, tumors, joint and tendon injuries, and more. And they are noisy!

At the other end of the sound spectrum, ultrasound imaging is silent, but ironically it uses sound to see inside the body. The equipment interprets the way sound waves bounce off internal structures to create images that can depict growing fetuses, circulatory problems, breast and prostate tumors, gallbladder disease, and more. All using super high frequency sound waves that we cannot hear.

Finally, a PET scan uses radioactive liquids that you drink or have injected to create its images. Like MRIs, PET scans can take awhile to complete. They can diagnose Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases, cancer, epilepsy and more.

As you can see, there are several ways to obtain a picture of health. I hope this helps you choose the one best for you.

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