Food for thought

"Before you jump
Tell me what you find when you read my mind" - The Killers (Read my Mind)

If I were to ever choose a superpower the ability to read minds would not be top of my list*. But sometimes it's quite helpful to know what's going on in the brain, or potentially what's going wrong. So as part of my ongoing exploration of the Bristol hospital system, the other week I went to Frenchay hospital to have an electroencephalogram (EEG). An EEG measures the voltage fluctuations along the scalp caused by ionic current flows in the brain and detected through a series of electrodes plastered over your head.  As such, the first task was was to attach an impressive number of electrodes to my scalp using a conductive gel.

I was then asked to lie back and open and close my eyes upon request while a strobe light flashed with increasing frequency. Despite the flashes and the fact that I must have looked like something from a sci-fi film, it was actually quite restful at times. So much so that I even nearly fell asleep at one point during an eyes closed period.

Part of the scan - I'm not sure what it means other than that I must have at least some thoughts!

Sadly the data they get from such a scan isn't as visually appealing as some of the imaging techniques I've come across. Once again I got the technician to show me what came up on his computer screen but it would need an expert to understand what any of it meant. Apparently the bit where I nodded off was detected as an electrical impulse (because your eyes start to roll when you fall asleep) but thankfully it didn't invalidate any of the data.

Another part of the scan, where I'm clearly more vacant (and apparently the blip is where I dozed off)

So the EEG read my mind, in a way, but it's not entirely clear what this means for the future. Nothing anomalous was found during the scan, but the drugs I'm currently on may be suppressing any changes which is why my brain appears normal. So only time will tell whether I'm fine or my brain will continue to sporadically do the human equivalent of the Blue Screen of Death.

* For the record, teleportation would be the clear winner - I mean, who wouldn't want to be able to flit around the world, not to mention all the time you'd save on the daily commute?  Telekinesis might be a close second.