Tips for surviving an At Home Video EEG test
August 5, 2016 5:39 PM   Subscribe

I'm scheduled to be outfitted with an ambulatory eeg with video monitoring early next week. What should I expect?

An EEG that I had last week to try to pinpoint what might be causing my recently diagnosed polyneuropathy with muscle wasting came up abnormal.

Probably due to recent health-related anxieties attributable to both my symptoms and the daily barrage of diagnostic tests (Brain and spine MRIs, EMGs etc.) I had anxiety before the EEG and had to stop and restart the test within the first 8 or so minutes due to a panic attack with an accompanying (imaginary?) burning smell. I was able to clam down enough in 5 minutes to continue the test although I remained anxious and fidgety. Of course I googled whether that might screw up the results when I got home and found articles that show people with panic disorders sometimes have slow waves- but regardless the Dr. was made aware of the panic attack but still wants to rule out a seizure disorder.

(an aside- as a child and teenager I had a terrible anxiety problem with weekly and sometimes daily panic attacks. These cleared up in my early twenties and were very rare until the past few weeks when my stress levels have been through the roof: googling insurance diagnostic codes was a mistake)

Anyway, I'm a person who values their privacy and who is extremely fidgety- especially when I'm required to relax or stay still, and *especially* if I haven't had any exercise recently. Has anyone had any experience with what it's like to be on camera with electrodes all over your head for 48 hours? Especially as an out-patient? I've googled the heck out of this but am mostly just seeing brochures from the device makers.

Obviously (I hope?) I'll be getting more details and answers when I'm hooked up and sent on my way next Tuesday but any advice or experience that you could share will help me stop freaking out/obsessing. I'm pretty okay with needles and have a relatively high pain tolerance so I made it through the other tests but for whatever reason just thinking about 48 hours of this is making me feel agoraphobic.
posted by stagewhisper to Health & Fitness (1 answer total)
 
Response by poster: okay wow that was a lonely question-
anyway, if it helps anyone else who searches for this topic- a couple of answers to my question:

1. fidgeting was okay, I was allowed to fidget which helped

2. since you aren't carrying the video monitor into the bathroom etc. it worked for me to step outside of camera range a few times a day for as long as I needed to in order to feel less anxious

3. don't make the mistake I did by assuming the wrap over the electrodes would loosen up over time- it didn't. By the first evening I had trouble sleeping from the pain of the electrodes digging into my scalp regardless of how I tried to position myself. By the second day the pain was excruciating. Tension headaches from the pressure are common and you will be allowed to take tylenol etc. But I had huge egg-sized welts mixed with lacerations that were still visible and not fully healed three weeks the electrodes were removed. I don't think that's normal, I think it's because I allowed the bandaging to be applied much too tightly, so if you are being suited up with one of these babies make sure the tech errs on the side of too loose rather than too tight when they are wrapping you up.
posted by stagewhisper at 6:22 PM on September 5, 2016


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