CT scan on a Siemens Somaton scanner
I just had a CT scan of the abdomen and pelvis with oral contrast but without IV contrast. Lying on the couch, I see that the scanner was a Siemens Somaton model. It displays on top of the ring 3 numbers in units of kV, mA and s. The first two I know are voltage and current units and the last one I presume is time in seconds. I did not pay attention to the actual numbers as I don't know their significance. The couch went into the tunnel; I was asked to take a deep breath and hold, then a scan was made. I thought that was it. But then the numbers suddenly jumped up by a lot and then the couch started moving again. This surprised me and I memorized the numbers. The "kV" did not change and is still 12. The "mA" number jumped up to 500 and the "s" number jumped up to 11.1. I was asked again to take a deep breath and hold, then a second scan was made. The next day I didn't feel well. Could I be getting too much radiation from the two passes? Is the second pass necessary and are those numbers reasonable ?