As Clare sipped the 600 ml of water she was required to drink prior to her scan (the nurses have a category - they call them the 'water-drinkers'), we listened to a thickset man with a disabled son talking loudly to his friend. After getting to know way too much about the disabled young man's condition, conversation turned to his daughter.
"She was at college studying hairdressing, but her friends decided to drop out and so she dropped out too. I told her she was being stupid."
"What's she doing now?"
"Working in the garage at Sainsburys."
While this narrative of feckless working class youth unfolded, I idly studied the wallchart shown above. Computed tomography; the manipulation of quantum-mechanical spin in MRI; the production and imaging of therapeutic ultrasound. Thinking of the theoretical sophistication and awesome engineering deployed just a few feet away I wondered how it can be possible that we all belong to the same species.
No results yet: Clare will see a specialist tomorrow.
