MRI accident has prompted the company that installed the scanner to issue a safety warning
A recent projectile incident inside of an MRI suite prompted the company that services the scanner to issue a safety reminder.
Earlier this year, photos of a wheelchair lodged in the bore of an MRI scanner began to circulate online. Although the exact location where the incident occurred has not been revealed, MXR Imaging—a company that sells, refurbishes, installs and services imaging equipment—has shared that it involved one the 1.5T scanners it had previously installed.
In a post shared on the company’s website, MXR revealed that the accident occurred when a disabled patient’s husband attempted to help the MRI tech transfer her once her exam was complete. The man unknowingly grabbed a wheelchair that was not MR conditional and attempted to bring it into the suite. He had just entered the room when the wheelchair went flying into the scanner’s bore. The patient was unharmed, but the technologist sustained an arm injury when they tried to block the chair from hitting the scanner.
The chair inflicted significant damage to the scanner. According to MXR, the extraction itself cost around $10,000, while the necessary repairs were billed for another $55,000. These figures do not take into account the revenue that was lost while the scanner was being repaired.
MXR used the event as an opportunity to highlight some simple safety measures that could have prevented it from occurring in the first place. The company advised that the use of a walk-through magnetometer or a handheld ferrous metal detector could have alerted both the staff and patient’s family that the chair was not MRI-safe, intercepting it before it made its way into the suite.
“The good news in this case is everyone and everything survived. The MRI machine survived the MRI magnet accident—although the wheelchair may not be so lucky. While every organization has magnetic safety protocols and training designed to prevent something like this, this story should come as a significant reminder that no organization is immune to human error,” the post reads. “Everyone needs to be reminded of the potential for an MRI unit to feed on its magnetic thirst.”
In addition to her background in journalism, Hannah also has patient-facing experience in clinical settings, having spent more than 12 years working as a registered rad tech. She began covering the medical imaging industry for Innovate Healthcare in 2021.