Cat Scan

Poor Tygger. First Daddy Ed Schwartz gets a law passed in City Council forcing him to get this wicked rabies shot. Then Schwartz puts out a press release telling people to come watch Dr. Orville R. Walls give the shot. And people did come. And took pictures, not just of the shot, but of Tygger getting his teeth checked, and Tygger getting his ears checked and Tygger getting his temperature taken. The cat handled it all with barely a squirm. But it was all for a good cause: publicizing new animal-control laws sponsored by Schwartz.

Lenny Dykstra, who took himself out of Sunday's game with back spasms, underwent a CAT scan yesterday at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. Phillies physician Phillip Marone said that the results would be available today, but that based on his examination, he did not think the problem was a particularly serious one. "I believe it to be just a muscular problem," said Marone, "but I won't really know for sure until (today). " Dykstra, who has his average up to .304, left the Phillies' win over New York on Sunday when his lower back stiffened.

John Martin's last name cost him his life. The Olney man, who had been undergoing alcohol detoxification at the Veterans Medical Center in Coatesville, Chester County, was transferred to the VA hospital in Philadelphia on Wednesday for a CAT scan that was intended for another Coatesville patient of the same name. Immediately after being injected with an iodine dye used for the procedure, Martin, 39, experienced difficulty breathing and required emergency treatment. Eighteen hours later, he was dead.

Common Pleas Court Judge Leon Katz yesterday threw out a $986,000 jury award to a woman who contended that she lost her psychic powers after a CAT scan, saying the verdict was "grossly excessive" and not based on the evidence. Acting on a motion by attorneys for Temple University Hospital, Katz ordered a new trial in the lawsuit by Judith Richardson Haimes. The verdict, which received national attention when it was announced in March, was "so grossly excessive as to shock the court's sense of justice," Katz wrote in an opinion.

ARE WE outraged about Jason Lucas' being denied a CAT scan because of his size? You bet we are. But not for the reasons outlined by Lucas in yesterday's Daily News. As far as we're concerned, it's his charge of denial of medical care that's outrageous. The decision of Presbyterian Hospital to no longer perform a procedure on a person who exceeded the weight of their machine's capability seems like a sound decision. If the hospital made any mistake, it was breaking the rules in previous years to allow Lucas to have his scan.

Mummy-wrapped, the patient lies flat on his back inside a $1.5 million cylinder that doctors hope will pinpoint a neurological problem by using a magnet 5,000 times the strength of gravity. In the next room, technicians, peering at the patient through sliding-glass windows, check the freeze-frame images of the brain on computer screens. Then, with the touch of a button, they trigger the 6-foot-tall camera that turns the images into photographs. At first glance, this looks like someone receiving a CAT scan, the computerized axial tomography X-ray that almost every hospital has acquired the capability of doing since the scanner was developed about 15 years ago. But many of the pictures are sharper, with the cavities of the brain and various types of tissue, blood and bone clearly distinguishable in shadings of black, white and gray.

John Kruk, hanging on his wife's left arm, limped up the airport ramp. Beneath a black "Chevy Trucks" cap, his eyes - glassy from the medication that helped him sleep on the 2 1/2-hour flight from Philadelphia yesterday - looked around to see what awaited him. He winced occasionally as he walked, but it was a surgical wound that hurt him now, not the cancerous testicle that was removed less than 48 hours earlier. His spirits, he said, were good. He predicted that he'd be playing baseball in two weeks.

After recently disclosing that any of 12 workers at two Veterans Hospitals might have prevented a mixup that led to the accidental death of a patient, VA officials promised that the workers faced disciplinary action that could include dismissal. But yesterday, a VA official said the most serious penalty initiated against any of the workers was a 10-day suspension without pay. Three of the workers face a five-day suspension without pay, two others have received reprimands, and five will receive "admonishments," said David Berg, special assistant to the VA director in Philadelphia.

I would like to commend Judge Leon Katz for rejecting the ridiculous damage award to Judith Haimes, who said that a CAT scan impaired her psychic powers. I certainly wonder by what criteria the jurors reached their decision. Where is their reasoning or common sense? One can lose psychic ability at any time. Surely, if Ms. Haines was psychic at the time she would have sensed a problem with the test. I applaud Judge Katz for his wise decision and integrity. Kathleen Gillespie Croydon.

As a psychic, Judith Richardson Haimes led police to missing bodies, making believers out of skeptical officers. But as a plaintiff in civil court in Philadelphia, she was unable to prove she had a case. Common Pleas Judge Leon Katz yesterday dismissed Haimes' claim that a CAT scan performed nearly 10 years ago at Temple University Hospital left her with headaches that made it impossible for her to use her powers. Haimes had contended that the hospital and Dr. Judith Hart, a neuro- radiologist, were negligent in giving her the CAT scan after she told them she was allergic to the dye used in the test.

D OUG COLLINS' meeting with the media following Tuesday's embarrassing, 98-84 loss to the Orlando Magic has attracted more attention than all the news conferences Andy Reid had in his 14 seasons with the Eagles. Collins left little to the imagination, so here's a look at all that he said: (Opening statement) I sure didn't see this effort coming. I thought we played incredibly hard against Miami, incredibly hard in New York on Sunday. This is mind-numbing to me. We went up, 29-20, and, from that point on, I couldn't even tell you what occurred.

IF THE 76ERS are feeling the pressure of the desperate times that are upon them, they certainly are masking it well. With a four-game deficit staring at them for the eighth and final postseason spot in the East and the lowly Orlando Magic providing the competition Tuesday, it would have seemed to have been the perfect time to start the stampede toward the playoffs. Instead, the Sixers looked more like a team playing out the string in losing their sixth in a row, this time by 98-84.

Charlotte Bobcats rookie Michael Kidd-Gilchrist suffered a concussion in Saturday's fourth-quarter collision with teammate Jeff Taylor in Houston. The Camden native, the second overall pick in last year's draft, went up to defend Toney Douglas' layup attempt early in the fourth quarter on Saturday night. Taylor swooped in and his right hip connected with the back of Kidd-Gilchrist's head. Kidd-Gilchrist lay motionless for several minutes. The athletic training staffs from both teams came out to check on him, and the entire Charlotte bench eventually surrounded him. Medical personnel fit Kidd-Gilchrist with a neck brace.

YOUNG AMERICANS have a lot at stake in Tuesday's presidential election, but nothing is more important than ensuring enactment of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Mentioned repeatedly during the first two presidential debates, "Obamacare" is now the subject of intense, and annoying, campaign advertisements. But lost amid all this ominous talk of mandates, fines and government takeovers is a clear understanding of the ACA's many benefits to those of us under 40. I hope the possibility of a potential Romney administration repealing the ACA elicits serious concern, because the ACA is vital to the health of our country.

Jacksonville Jaguars running back Maurice Jones-Drew, the NFL's leading rusher in 2011, ended his holdout on Sunday - and he isn't sorry about taking the 38-day break. "I did something I felt was right, and I'm always going to feel right," the pocket powerhouse said. "And that's why I can come back and not have a negative attitude. I think if you regret things, you're going to come back salty, be a distraction, things like that. " (Our new motto: Never be salty.) After a 40-minute talk with coach Mike Mularkey, MJD answered media questions about his holdout for half an hour.

Cecilia Ready lives up to her name. We'd just started talking about what it's like to be a 70-year-old adjunct professor working through a third bout of cancer when Ready's tongue grew heavy and she began slurring her words. "Come," she insists calmly after calling her doctor, "we'll do the interview in the E.R. " I hesitate, but am assured by her colleagues in the English department at St. Joseph's University that Ready's unbridled determination is not a reaction to chemo or steroids.

CLEARWATER, Fla. - Roy Oswalt knows he was lucky and unlucky in the same instant. He was lucky because the line drive off the bat of Tampa Bay's Manny Ramirez in the fourth inning of Wednesday's Grapefruit League game against the Rays did not leave the Phillies righthander more seriously hurt. Oswalt, struck on the neck just below his right ear, had a former teammate who was not nearly as fortunate. "I actually had a good friend [who] got hit in the neck - Mike Coolbaugh - that used to play with us with the Astros," Oswalt said Thursday.

The Eagles are holding a Media Chalk Talk on Tuesday night down at the NovaCare Complex. In a shocking development, and despite my uninterrupted criticism of the organization, I've been added to the guest list. What sort of information do you think will be gleaned from the evening (complete with Howie Roseman, hors d'oeuvres, and an open bar)? And, my invitation was almost certainly a clerical error, right? I'm writing this from a doctor's office as I await a CAT scan. Want to trade?

Right winger Ian Laperriere, called a "heart and soul guy on our hockey team" by Flyers general manager Paul Holmgren on Tuesday, will likely miss the rest of the playoffs. Laperriere, injured when he blocked a slapshot in the Flyers' 3-0 playoff win in New Jersey on Thursday, has a mild concussion and a contusion of the brain, Holmgren said. Laperriere needed nearly 70 stitches above his right eye and lost vision for a few minutes after being hit by Paul Martin's shot, causing blood to spew around center ice. Lapierrere has regained his eyesight, but Saturday he told Holmgren he "just wasn't feeling right," the general manager said.

Scanners harm rights, maybe health I take exception to the U.S. government's recent call for full body scans in airport security. The government should not be permitted to search what is under our clothes. The Constitution's Fourth Amendment protects Americans against unreasonable random searches and seizures, which in essence is what the government is attempting to do. Furthermore, there are health issues that add to the problem. Despite the fact that the radiation given off by these body scanners is not as harmful as that in a CAT scan, how do we know what effect the scanners will have on our bodies after 10 years or more?