There's lots of ways we could have metal in our body. A hip replacement, a forgotten piercing, old tooth fillings, maybe you accidentally swallowed some piece of metal.

If MRI scanners are this deadly, everybody should be really thoroughly screened and scanned to be allowed into the room. And even into the room next to it. How can the door of that room open while the machine is still turned on? (Edit: apparently the magnets in these machines usually can't be turned off, which changes the question to: how was he allowed to enter the room at all?)

But wearing such a heavy chain while accompanying your spouse to an MRI scan, is also not the best move.

> There's lots of ways we could have metal in our body. A hip replacement, a forgotten piercing, old tooth fillings, maybe you accidentally swallowed some piece of metal

One of the reasons they ask what you do for work is because if you're doing some sort of job that involves working with metal (e.x. cutting pipes, welding, etc) there are extra precautions to take.

Indeed. The hospital will pay a lot of money. Metal detectors are insanely cheap, there's no reason why there shouldn't be one before reaching the door as a default cautionary measure.

Depending on how or where they are installed, they risk being pointless. Every human has mental on them and it’s mostly safe (in shoes, bra, zips, buckles, access swipe card). Little bits of jewellery are fine. Surgically implanted metal is mostly fine.

Having an alarm that goes off for a staff member’s bra 200x a day leads to normalisation of hearing the alarm, and the unsafe things gets missed.

Im an MR tech.

Of course you don't want to ignore that alarm 200 times a day. That's why I'd rather just ban everything with metal. All of these things have non-metal alternatives that you could easily enforce in such a specialized setting. Why wouldn't you, if it can save lives?

That's a very easy fix. Just make the volume proportional to the amount of metal detected.

And the 10+ a day with a knee joint or a hip joint replacement?

And then what if they also have a pacemaker or aneurysm clip?

An unsafe clip is tiny, and it will kill them. You can’t depend on a metal detector.

Technology might help, but people following process is what safety depends on.

If staff follow the rules the MR suite is very safe.

https://mrisafety.com/

What does this mean? I thought you can't get close with any ferrous metal whatsoever. If it beeps, you're not allowed in. It's not like in an airport where "oh it's just a coin".

No, you can.

Belts, buckles, bra etc are fine on staff.

A coin is a problem. Hip or knee joint replacement and various screws and plates are fine (some contain some iron).

Like all bad answers, the answer as to whether it’s ok in the scan room is ‘it depends’.

Metal detectors can detect nonferrous metals too.

The walls are usually made from mu-metal. This is a metal mixture that blocks/attenuates magnetic energy.

Spinning rust hard drives are also made with mu-metal as well.

I had two head MRI’s, and both times I was equally terrified my metal fillings would start bouncing around my head.

Wait till you learn about Peripheral Nerve Stimulation effects:

https://www.robarts.ca/scholl_group/research/peripheral_nerv...