Posts Tagged ‘fatality’
Tuesday, July 6th, 2010
Last year I highlighted an FDA MRI accident report in which a technologist had to have a pair of scissors surgically removed from his forehead after they’d caught him between the magnet-homing missile that they became, and the isocenter of the MRI. You may remember that I fauxtoshopped a hypothesis as to what that accident would have looked like on plain film: perhaps something like this… Click For More On What This Accident Was Like…
Tags: accident, death, fatality, FDA, force, imaging, injury, magnetic, MAUDE, missile, MRI, patient, projectile, radiographer, resonance, safety, scissors, Technologist, translational
Posted in Ferromagnetic Detection for MRI Safety | No Comments »
Tuesday, June 15th, 2010
Yes, I’ve not kept up with my blog postings as I usually do. I’d like to tell you that it was because I’ve been spending the last month or so sipping umbrella-drinks on a sunny beach somewhere, but that’s about the furthest thing from the truth. The fact is that there have been torrents of activity, but they’re all happening below the glassy surface. For example, the radiology press has been strangely silent about the most recent MRI fatality…
Click To Read More About The Recent MRI Death…
Tags: accident, blower, cylinder, death, design, engineer, fan, fatality, FDA, gas, imaging, injury, magnetic, medical, missile, MRI, oxygen, projectile, radiology, report, resonance, safety, service, tank, vendor
Posted in Ferromagnetic Detection for MRI Safety, Other MRI Safety | 2 Comments »
Thursday, February 4th, 2010
This week the settlement documents were released — closing the chapter on the lawsuit that arose from the seminal event in MRI safety, the 2001 oxygen tank fatality of then-six-year-old Michael Colombini.
Click To Learn More About The Accident And Settlement…
Tags: accident, civil, colombini, death, fatality, ferromagnetic, hazard, imaging, injury, lawsuit, liability, magnet, magnetic, magnetic resonance, medical, metal, missile, MR, MRI, patient, projectile, radiology, regulation, resonance, safety, screening, suit, trial
Posted in Ferromagnetic Detection for MRI Safety, Other MRI Safety | 2 Comments »
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009
That’s right. Yesterday, October 26th, the Colombini family formally accepted a settlement offer for the MRI vs. oxygen tank accident which killed their 6-year-old son in 2001. The settlement puts to rest 8 years of litigation resulting from the single largest MRI safety incident in the industry’s consciousness. And though precedent-setting verdicts won’t result, the dollar-value of the settlement will likely cause many MRI providers to sit up and take notice.
Just how much is the settlement? Click Here To Learn More About The Settlement…
Tags: accident, colombini, court, death, fatality, ferromagnetic, hazard, imaging, injury, lawsuit, legal, magnetic, MRI, projectile, radiology, regulation, resonance, risk, safety, settlement, suit, Westchester Medical Center
Posted in Other MRI Safety | 3 Comments »
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009
Yes, I think I’ve written at least twice before about the imminent start of the trial for the civil lawsuit stemming from the Michael Colombini fatal MRI accident in 2001. And, yes, I was wrong both times before. So, I would expect nothing less than readers of this entry to take my 3rd prognostication of the start of the trial with something more than a grain of salt… perhaps an entire salt lick! But today a little birdie told me that there’s a hole in the otherwise-booked New York Supreme Court trial schedule for late October / early November and the Colombini trial may just fit right in there.
Click Here To Read More About The Trial…
Tags: accident, civil, colombini, cylinder, death, fatality, ferromagnetic, hazard, hospital, injury, judge, lawsuit, lawyer, magnet, missile, motion, MRI, oxygen, patient, projectile, radiology, safety, sue, tank, Technologist, translational, trial, Westchester
Posted in Other MRI Safety | No Comments »
Sunday, August 23rd, 2009
Last month, the judge in the Michael Colombini lawsuit (the case resulting from the infamous death by oxygen tank / cylinder brought into the MRI room while the boy was in the scanner) decided on three of the last outstanding pre-trial motions. The Judge’s decisions appear to have excused one defendant, entirely, and tempered the degree of potential liability for others.
Click Here To Learn Who’s In, And Who’s Out…
Tags: colombini, court, death, fatality, ferromagnetic, injury, lawsuit, legal, liability, magnet, magnetic resonance, metal, missile, MRI, New York, patient, projectile, radiologist, radiology, risk, safety, suit, Technologist, trial, Westchester
Posted in Ferromagnetic Detection for MRI Safety, Other MRI Safety | 10 Comments »
Friday, May 22nd, 2009
One of the most oft-cited rationalizations for not complying with contemporary best practices that call for using ferromagnetic detection (FMD) for MRI pre-screening is that ‘FMD doesn’t catch anything that existing screening protocols aren’t meant to catch.’ What you may find surprising about this statement is that I agree with it wholeheartedly… I would just change the inflection a bit. I would say it more like…
Ferromagnetic detection doesn’t catch anything that existing screening protocols aren’t meant to catch.
That inflection makes a world of difference, as you’ll see in just a moment…
Click These Words Here To See What I Mean…

Office Chair Sucked Into MRI:
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Tags: accident, care, detection, detector, fatality, ferromagnetic, hazard, injury, magnet, magnetic resonance, metal, missile, MR, MRI, patient, photo, picture, projectile, risk, safety, screening, standard, Technologist, translational, video
Posted in Ferromagnetic Detection for MRI Safety | 2 Comments »
Saturday, April 18th, 2009
Nearly all MRI accidents that wind up the subject of civil lawsuits conclude the same way… in confidential settlement protected by a non-disclosure agreement (NDA). This makes it extremely difficult to get to the facts associated with any particular accident. Currently the highest profile MRI accident (the death of a young boy from a flying oxygen cylinder) is in pre-trial litigation and is our best window into the legal responsibility of Technologists and providers. Today, however, I learned of another suit in which a Tech is suing her former employer for willfully putting off needed system repairs that compromised image quality and diagnostic value.
Click to Read More About This MRI Safety Lawsuit…
Tags: coil, colombini, daignostic, death, diagnosis, fatality, FL, Florida, Horizon, image quality, injury, lawsuit, magnetic, maintenance, MRI, news, practice, protocol, resonance, safety, standard of care, suit, Technologist, television, TV, Westchester
Posted in Other MRI Safety | 2 Comments »
Wednesday, January 21st, 2009
No, this isn’t about federal banking bail-outs or corporate welfare. This is the cost, in real-world dollars, of an average single MRI projectile accident in the VA Healthcare system.
Click to read more about the costs of MRI missile accidents…
Tags: accident, cost, detector, expense, fatality, ferromagnetic, force, injury, magnetic, Mednovus, metal, missile, MRI, projectile, resonance, risk, ROI, safety, translational
Posted in Ferromagnetic Detection for MRI Safety | No Comments »
Tuesday, December 16th, 2008
Indeed. Nearly 8 years later, the civil lawsuit trial surrounding the infamous death of a 6-year old boy is scheduled to begin in March of 2009.
The multi-million dollar lawsuit has been grinding through the legal system as a myriad of claims and counter-claims have been ricocheting around among the parties. Those who’ve been watching the pre-trial activities may attest to it sometimes resembling a soap-opera with shifting alliances, but it appears that the parties’ day in court will come in less than 100 days.
Click to read more about the fast-approaching MRI death civil trial…
Tags: accident, civil, colombini, death, fatal, fatality, injury, law, missile, MRI, projectile, suit, trial
Posted in Ferromagnetic Detection for MRI Safety, Other MRI Safety | No Comments »