MRI machine at Nair shut

Mumbai: The sole Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) machine at the civic-run Nair Hospital is lying shut, for a clean up since Saturday after a 32-year-old man lost his life to it.

 This has caused inconvenience to several patients who are being referred to other civic and government-run hospitals including JJ hospital for the MRI scan. While a MRI test costs around `1,000 at state and civic-run hospitals, the same can cost over `5,000 or more at private diagnostic facilities.      

Rajesh Maru (32) had lost his life to the machine after he walked into the room with a liquid oxygen cylinder on the advise of a ward boy. He was pulled into the machine and had died due to inhaling the gas that had leaked due to the collision. Dr Devidar Shetty, head of radiology department, Nair Hospital, said, “Since the oxygen cylinder blast took place in the room, the entire room needs to be cleaned. For doing so and making it ready for use, it will take about a day or two. The MRI machine, which is currently not functioning, will require repair, which might further take a few more days.”

Jagdish Solanki, a social worker, said, “Up to 600 people, who wanted to get their MRI scan done, have been shoved away from Nair Hospital. Poor people are suffering.”

To get an MRI scan done, there is a long waiting list in the civic as well as state-run hospitals. An MRI scanner uses strong magnetic fields, electric field gradients, and radio waves to generate images of organs in the body. Metallic objects are not allowed in MRI rooms.