Category: MR Scanners

Pediatric MRI Safety Surveyed

Posted on by Brian Casey

This past year has seen a renewed focus on MRI safety after a fatal accident in New York in 2025. Most of the attention has been on adult MRI, but what about kids? A new analysis in JACR finds that pediatric MRI accidents are fortunately rare, but occur often enough that continued vigilance is warranted. 

Pediatric MRI poses particular safety challenges to imaging facilities. Caregivers are often in the scanning room to comfort children, and sedation is frequently required to keep kids still during exams. 

  • But pediatric MRI safety hasn’t been studied as extensively as it has in adults, so researchers from five U.S. children’s hospitals reviewed MRI safety events that occurred at their facilities from 2017 to 2022.

Researchers focused on reported events that occurred within Zone IV, the area under the ACR’s four-zone safety model that includes the scanner room. They found…

  • A total of 146 safety events occurred in Zone IV out of 541k pediatric exams, for an event rate of 0.027%. 
  • An average of 4.9 events per year occurred at each site, or 3.3 events per 100k exams.
  • Event types involved projectiles (30%), burn/thermal injuries (13%), and implants (10%).
  • 78 events (53%) directly involved patients.
  • Ten events (6.8%) were classified as serious.

Frequent causes of events included medical equipment and supplies (anesthesia equipment and monitors, stethoscopes, and needles) and personal items like phones and badges.

  • Implanted devices like cochlear implants represent a growing challenge, as 20%-30% of children getting MRI scans have them, and safety events occurred despite sites following manufacturers’ guidelines. 

Why did the safety events happen? Study authors found that MRI safety protocols weren’t followed in 60% of events.

  • Lack of protocol adherence is a common refrain in MRI accidents that have involved adults, illustrating that all the guidelines and rules in the world won’t help if they aren’t followed to the letter.

The Takeaway

The new study on pediatric MRI safety highlights the fact that children shouldn’t just be treated like little adults when it comes to safe scanning procedures. The research offers a benchmark against which pediatric imaging facilities can measure themselves, while also offering additional guidance on mistakes to avoid when scanning kids.

Why MRI Providers Make Patient Comfort a Top Priority

Posted on by Partner Content

Smart MRI providers know patient comfort is linked to profitability. After all, the comfort quotient impacts image quality, diagnostic accuracy, operational efficiency, and patient satisfaction. 

  • Yet at least one-third of adult patients report distress, moderate anxiety, and discomfort related to MRI, according to a systematic review involving 220 patients.

When patients are claustrophobic or uncomfortable, it negatively impacts MRI providers…

  • Fidgety patients lead to motion artifacts/poor quality images and the need to retake scans – impacting overall productivity.
  • Sedating patients requires additional safety precautions, costing time and money.
  • Cancellations and no-shows due to patient anxiety translate to lost revenue.
  • Patients who have an uncomfortable MRI experience may go elsewhere next time – reducing repeat business and word-of-mouth referrals.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Providers should seek out high-performance MRI systems designed with patient comfort in mind…

  • Shorter scans – The shorter the scan, the easier it is for patients to stay still. Fujifilm’s ECHELON Synergy MRI features up to 50% scan time reduction over previous generation 1.5T MRI scanners, and a 70-cm-wide bore with a 62-cm-wide table to enhance comfort.
  • Software tools – A study found that 15-20% of MRI scans require re-scan due to patient motion. ECHELON Synergy offers software that mitigates the impact of motion artifacts, making it easier and quicker to complete scans on fidgety patients.
  • Open design – Put claustrophobic patients at ease and scanning needn’t stop mid-way through an exam. Providers are alleviating anxiety and boosting efficiency with Fujifilm’s OASIS Velocity MRI, which features a true open design, where patients have an unobstructed view for maximum comfort. OASIS Velocity also supports patients who weigh up to 660 pounds.
  • Easy access – Improving comfort for all patient populations can help keep a facility competitive. Fujifilm’s APERTO Lucent is a powerful permanent magnet open-sided 0.4T MRI that delivers an optimal patient experience. Its unique single-pillar design provides ideal technologist-patient access, and the wide, laterally moving table lowers to 20 inches, ensuring easy access for pediatric, elderly, and/or injured patients.

Hospitals and imaging facilities across the U.S. rely on Fujifilm for state-of-the-art, patient-centric MRI systems. For example…

Make patient comfort a top priority and give your MRI business a competitive edge with solutions from FUJIFILM Healthcare Americas Corp. 

Uneven Access to Brain MRI

Posted on by Brian Casey

Patients from disadvantaged neighborhoods or those traveling farther for brain MRI scans presented in worse clinical condition than patients with better access. That’s according to a new JACR study that reopens the debate over disparities in healthcare access. 

The past several years have seen numerous studies published that document disparities in healthcare access and their impact on clinical outcomes.

Many previous studies have also concentrated on access to care in rural areas, in which long distances make it harder for patients to travel to medical centers.

  • In the current study, researchers led by authors from Emory University flipped the script to examine care access in the Atlanta metropolitan area in an effort to quantify how distance and socioeconomic status might impact patient care. 

They examined the demographic backgrounds of 4.8k patients who got brain MRI scans over a one-year period starting in March 2019, calculating factors like distance from home to imaging facility and socioeconomic status based on the area deprivation index. 

  • They then correlated these data to patient illness severity – also known as acuity – when they presented for their scans, using a three-point scale ranging from normal (level 1) to findings requiring a change in patient management (level 3).

Based on the data, researchers found…

  • Patients in neighborhoods with lower socioeconomic status had 34% higher odds of level 2 acuity versus level 1 for inpatient scans and 27% higher for emergency scans. 
  • Patients living twice the distance from an imaging facility had 6.5% higher odds of level 2 acuity compared to level 1, and 15% higher for level 3.
  • Other factors affecting acuity level included age, race, and insurance status.
  • Medicaid recipients in particular were sicker, with 68% higher odds of acuity level 2 and 81% higher odds of acuity level 3 compared to those with commercial insurance. 

The findings track with other studies that have linked chronic health conditions with brain pathologies, such as the connection between diabetes and stroke. 

The Takeaway

The new findings offer additional details on how patient demographics affect both their health status and their access to care, in particular for advanced imaging scans like brain MRI. Follow-up studies could examine whether a similar phenomenon occurs with CT, which is the workhorse modality for emergency imaging. 

Why Radiology Leaders Are Turning to AI – And Why They’re Not Looking Back

Posted on by Partner Content

From single-scanner clinics to university hospitals, radiology leaders around the globe face the same challenge: keeping up with rising patient demand while managing costs.

MRI volumes are climbing. Scanner hours and budgets? Not so much.

  • Under pressure to do more with less, decision-makers are reaching a conclusion that was unthinkable just a few years ago: AI-powered MRI is no longer a novelty – it’s a necessity.

No matter the size or scale of the operation, diagnostic imaging providers face a familiar set of challenges:

  • High capital costs – New scanners cost seven figures, and upgrades run hundreds of thousands.
  • Limited capacity – Most sites can’t easily add scanners, staff, or hours to meet demand.
  • Rising demand – MRI volume continues to grow as chronic conditions rise and preventive care gains traction.
  • Patient expectations – Long, uncomfortable exams frustrate patients who may look elsewhere.

AI offers a path forward, helping imaging teams handle more studies without compromising diagnostic standards.

AIRS Medical built SwiftMR, AI-powered MRI reconstruction software, to meet today’s imaging challenges. Hospitals and clinics in over 35 countries use SwiftMR to:

  • Reduce scan times by up to 50% compared to standard protocols.
  • Deliver sharper images radiologists can trust.
  • Enhance the patient experience with shorter exams and fewer motion-related rescans.

SwiftMR is vendor-neutral, compatible with all MRI makes, models, and field strengths.

FDA-cleared, MDR-certified, and clinically validated, SwiftMR is trusted by over 300 imaging providers in the U.S. and over 1,000 globally, including:

These outcomes show that AI-powered MRI delivers tangible operational, clinical, and financial benefits across site types and geographies. 

Watch this video to learn more about SwiftMR.

The Takeaway

Radiology leaders are relying on SwiftMR to transform how they deliver care. From enterprise networks to single-scanner clinics, imaging teams are unlocking new levels of efficiency and patient care.

MRI of Bullet Fragments Is Possible

Posted on by Brian Casey

Radiology has a renewed focus on MRI safety following the tragic death of a New York man in an MRI accident last month. With that in mind, a new JACR study looks at adverse MRI events caused by an uncommon but still important phenomenon: retained bullet fragments in patients getting scans. 

MRI is radiology’s most powerful modality, but its strong magnetic fields can be hazardous – and on extremely rare occasions even fatal – for both patients and medical personnel.

  • Patients are supposed to be screened for metallic implants, jewelry, and other contraindications, but how often do providers know to ask about retained bullet fragments?

Having a retained bullet fragment on its own isn’t a contraindication for MRI, but providers do need to know where fragments are located and how large they are.

  • If pre-scan screening discovers a patient with a retained fragment, they typically receive X-rays of the involved area to determine location and size – scans should be aborted if the fragment is in a solid organ or within 5 mm of an important artery or vein.

If all these steps are taken and the scan goes ahead, how often do adverse MRI events occur? 

  • Researchers reviewed 6.1k X-ray reports that contained the terms “bullet” or “shrapnel” over 13 years, finding 284 patients who got an MRI scan after a retained fragment was found on radiography.

They found…

  • Only four patients (1.8%) experienced symptoms during MRI scans.
  • Each of the exams was terminated early due to patient discomfort, with three patients reporting burning and one general discomfort.
  • None of the symptomatic exams had the bullet in the MRI field of view.
  • No serious injury and no follow-up care was required. 

The Takeaway

The new findings are encouraging by showing that with careful patient screening and monitoring, MRI scans can be performed on patients with retained bullet fragments. But as always, MRI operators must remain vigilant and adhere to published MRI safety guidelines.

MRI Reveals Junk Food’s Toll on Carotid Arteries

Posted on by Brian Casey

As the U.S. government weighs a regulatory crackdown on ultra-processed food, a new study indicates the feds may be on to something. Researchers used MRI to discover that people who consumed more ultra-processed food had higher levels of carotid arterial plaque – a risk factor for cardiovascular disease. 

The FDA and the USDA on July 23 announced the start of a new initiative to investigate the risks of ultra-processed foods and their relationship to chronic diseases such as obesity, heart disease, and cancer. 

  • The project is widely seen as a priority of HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and his Make America Healthy Again movement. 

Meanwhile, arterial plaque buildup is a sign of atherosclerosis and has been linked to multiple clinical conditions, from stroke to intraplaque hemorrhage. 

In the new paper in American Journal of Preventive Cardiology, researchers noted the established association between adverse cardiovascular events and consumption of ultra-processed food and beverages, but the association with subclinical disease hasn’t been explored. 

  • So researchers reviewed carotid MRI scans of 768 participants from the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities study, in which subjects also described their dietary intake with a 148-item questionnaire. 

MRI scans were correlated with dietary habits, finding that compared to the lowest quartile, people in the highest quartile of ultra-processed food consumption had…

  • Greater total arterial wall volume. 
  • Greater total lipid core volume and maximum lipid core area.
  • Higher maximum segmental wall thickness.

No correlation was found between arterial plaque and other types of diet measures, such as carbohydrate and fat intake or glycemic load index.

  • The findings suggest that much of the negative health effect from ultra-processed foods comes from their contribution to arterial plaque buildup, which could occur through their unfavorable nutrient profile leading to alterations in blood lipids.

The Takeaway

In today’s hyperpolarized political environment – in which scientific inquiry is often subordinated to already-solidified beliefs – the new findings connecting MRI measurements of carotid artery plaque to ultra-processed foods offer a foundation for public policy changes that could indeed improve the health of Americans.

MRI Accident Turns Deadly

Posted on by Brian Casey

A tragic MRI accident in Long Island, New York, has turned deadly. A man who was pulled into a mobile MRI scanner by a heavy chain he was wearing died of his injuries. 

Keith McAllister was waiting outside a mobile MRI trailer operated by Nassau Open MRI on Long Island as his wife received a knee scan.

  • McAllister was wearing a weight-training chain around his neck that weighed some 20 pounds.

When he entered the trailer to help his wife get off the scanner table, the system’s powerful 1.5T magnetic field drew him against the magnet. It took staff an hour to free him.

Investigators are still looking into the details of the episode, but it underscores the shortcomings in how MRI safety is regulated in the U.S., where fatal MRI accidents are extremely rare but still do occur.  

  • That’s according to MRI safety expert Tobias Gilk, vice president at architectural firm Radiology Planning and founder of Gilk Radiology Consultants, who spoke to The Imaging Wire about the accident.

The U.S. has some of the most comprehensive and sophisticated guidelines on MRI safety, encapsulated in the ACR Manual on MR Safety.

  • What’s more, the radiology community including ACR, ISMRM, ASRT, and others are currently observing their annual MR Safety Week to promote safe MRI scanning – an event that started just a few days after McAllister died.

But despite the great leaps in knowledge about MRI safety, Gilk believes that keeping patients safe is complicated by the exponential growth in the modality’s complexity, while actual enforcement of safety standards is lacking. 

  • Many state health departments don’t even address MRI safety as they focus more aggressively on regulating ionizing imaging modalities like CT and X-ray, and healthcare certification bodies like the Joint Commission lack enforcement teeth.

Instead, MRI safety often becomes the responsibility of technologists who frequently must juggle multiple tasks as they manage both patients and scanner operations.

  • This can be particularly challenging in mobile MRI coaches, often staffed by a single MRI technologist where the only barrier between the outside world and the scanning environment is just a single – often unlocked – door. 

The Takeaway

The tragic death of Keith McAllister in a mobile MRI trailer shows that all the guidelines and safety events in the world won’t keep patients safe unless accompanied by stronger enforcement of the knowledge the radiology community already has. We can do better.

Molecular MRI Adds Certainty to Cancer Diagnosis

Posted on by Partner Content

MRI has become an important tool in the detection, diagnosis, and treatment planning for many cancers, especially solid tumors. However, up until now, a lack of specificity has held back the full potential of MRI.  

While MRI is very good at identifying areas of interest, factors such as infection, benign tumors, post-traumatic areas, and inflammation can all increase vascularity and, therefore, enhancement of contrast and signal changes.  

  • As a result, MRI has a high rate of false positives – findings that may be flagged as something of concern but that are not necessarily malignant lesions.  

This lack of accuracy results in clinical care teams performing too many confirmatory biopsies, with most being benign.

Now a novel class of molecular imaging contrast agents developed by Imagion Biosystems brings a new level of specificity to MRI. 

  • The company’s MagSense imaging agents have the potential to improve the clinical utility of the large installed base of MRI systems across the globe through improved accuracy of interpretation, avoiding biopsies of benign lesions, driving earlier intervention and improving outcomes and quality of life.

Unlike gadolinium-based agents that non-specifically enhance tissue vascularity regardless of cause, MagSense imaging agents target receptors on cancer cells.  

  • By combining magnetic nanoparticles that have high susceptibility and r2 relaxivity with cancer-specific biomarkers, molecular MRI becomes possible.

Imagion’s superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles are coated with a cancer-specific targeting moiety, such as an antibody or peptide.

  • The cancer biomarker molecule causes the particles to bind to target-specific cancer cells, if present. If the lesion in question is not the target cancer, the particles do not bind.

Where the imaging agent has become attached to the tissue, the nanoparticles produce an identifiable change in MRI signal. 

  • This signal is easily detected by radiological review and can be quantitatively assessed.

Imagion has developed cancer-specific contrast imaging agents for HER2 breast cancer, prostate cancer, and ovarian cancer, and the MagSense platform can be adapted for any type of cancer for which there is a targeting moiety.  

  • Imagion is now preparing to initiate a multisite phase 2 study in the U.S. in HER2+ breast cancer patients to optimize imaging parameters and compare MagSense imaging to the standard of care.  

The Takeaway

Molecular-specific imaging agents like the MagSense technology from Imagion Biosystems create the opportunity for molecular MRI to fundamentally change how radiologists detect and monitor cancers. 

The company is publicly traded (ASX:IBX) and is looking to expand its U.S. investor base as it advances through its clinical programs. To become involved as an investigator or investor or to learn more visit their website.

MRI in Paradise – News from ISMRM 2025

Posted on by Brian Casey

The global MRI community this week traveled to paradise to convene its annual meeting of the International Society for Magnetic Resonance in Medicine. If you were one of the lucky ones to be in attendance in Honolulu, Hawaii for ISMRM 2025, you were treated to some of the latest news in radiology’s most powerful modality. 

As has been the case at other radiology meetings, AI took center stage in Honolulu. 

  • AI has multiple use cases in MRI, from helping radiologists interpret images more efficiently to accelerating scans and upscaling lower-field images to resemble high-field exams.

Just a few of the news highlights from ISMRM 2025 are below …

  • Using AI to interpret prostate MRI reduced reading times by 48% (250 to 120 seconds) while improving the diagnostic performance of both experienced and less experienced radiologists. 
  • AI of thyroid T2-weighted neck MRI scans demonstrated good accuracy (87%) for nodules larger than 1 cm, indicating a possible role for screening and monitoring.
  • Researchers presented progress in creating brain charts of white matter based on MRI scans of 24k cognitively healthy people that can be used to track normal and abnormal brain development.
  • Brain MRI showed that lower brain volumes in people with coronary artery disease were associated with worse aerobic fitness and higher BMI, revealing a link between cardiovascular and brain health. 
  • Chinese researchers showed their work on PMEEN, a multimodality brain scanner that combines PET, MRI, EEG, eye-tracking, and functional near-infrared spectroscopy. 
  • A Spanish team demonstrated research on a low-field PET/MRI scanner with focused ultrasound capability for therapeutic applications.
  • AI could be used during abbreviated breast MRI screening scans to convert women mid-exam to a full MRI protocol if abnormalities are detected.
  • 7T MRI was used to detect iron deposits in the brain, which could be a marker for Alzheimer’s disease.
  • MRI with an ultrashort echo time protocol could be an alternative to CT for following up lung nodules.
  • Researchers presented a deep learning-based approach to generating synthetic contrast-like MR images without gadolinium. 
  • MGH researchers showed progress in developing a 136mT portable MRI scanner for bedside brain scanning of preterm neonates.

The Takeaway

The rapid proliferation of news about AI-based MRI at ISMRM 2025 suggests its own vision of paradise – a world in which MRI can be deployed more widely than ever before, where radiologists with AI assistance detect disease in many cases before symptoms even occur. We can only dream.

MRI Recon Gets Real with AI-Driven Protocols

Posted on by Brian Casey

AI-based data reconstruction for MRI scans took a step forward this week with studies showing how to generate 3T-like images from ultralow-field scanners, and improve scanner efficiency by cutting energy consumption.

MRI is radiology’s premier modality, but MRI scanners are cumbersome to install and expensive to operate. 

  • Ultralow-field scanners could help but some believe they lack the image quality for some clinical applications. 

Enter AI-based image reconstruction. Deep learning protocols are being developed for a wide range of imaging modalities, from PET to CT to MRI. 

  • These algorithms take images acquired with lower-quality input data – be it less CT radiation dose or lower MRI field strength – and upscale them to resemble full-fidelity images.

This trend is illustrated by research published this week in Radiology in which researchers tested a generative adversarial network algorithm called LowGAN for reconstructing data acquired on Hyperfine’s Swoop 0.064T portable ultralow-field MRI scanner.

  • Their goal was to enable Swoop to generate images resembling those acquired on a 3T system. 

After training LowGAN on paired 3T and 0.064T images, they tested the algorithm in 50 patients with multiple sclerosis and further validated it with a separate 13-patient cohort. They then judged LowGAN against several measures of MR image quality, finding that it …

  • Showed the biggest improvement on synthetic FLAIR and T1 images.
  • Improved conspicuity of white matter lesions, without introducing false lesions.
  • Increased consistency of cortical and subcortical volume measurements with 3T images.
  • But was unable to reveal brain lesions that were missed in the original low-field scans. 

AI-based data reconstruction also has environmental implications. Medical imaging is a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, and anyone who’s managed an MRI operation knows how much energy these massive scanners consume. 

  • A second paper published this week in Radiology described how MRI acceleration – scans acquired at a faster speed and then reconstructed for better image quality – reduced energy use, lowering carbon emissions while boosting imaging capacity. 

Researchers tried three techniques for speeding MRI acquisition – parallel acceleration, simultaneous multi-slice, and a deep learning algorithm. 

  • All three reduced energy consumption 21% to 65% and increased daily capacity by one to seven scanning slots, with deep learning showing the biggest effect.

The Takeaway

The new papers demonstrate an exciting future in which less powerful data acquisition technologies can be upscaled with AI to produce images that more closely resemble state-of-the-art scanning. The benefits will be enjoyed by both patients and the planet.

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