TRH announces rollout of mobile MRI services

Three Rivers Health has announced that it will add a GE SIGNA Voyager mobile MRI to its imaging services in October.  The mobile MRI system is powered by deep learning software for superior high-resolution imaging.

Three Rivers Health is excited to be bringing this new service to the community and questions regarding scheduling can be addressed by calling 307-568-3311 or by faxing orders to 307-568-2139.

To obtain this new service, Three Rivers Health partnered with Monida Shared Imaging, a Montana-based mobile MRI company, to develop a new route serving much of eastern Montana and northern Wyoming. 

Monida Shared Imaging is a shared-service joint venture. Owned by a consortium of rural hospitals in central and western Montana, it is similar to a cooperative for farmers or ranchers.  As of August, the following eight hospitals had joined as new owners: Phillips County Hospital, Northeast Montana Health Services, Roosevelt Medical Center, Daniels Memorial Hospital, Sheridan Memorial Hospital, Garfield County Health Center, North Big Horn Hospital District and the Montana Health Network.   

By partnering with Monida Shared Imaging, facilities like TRH are able to share the costs of this expensive technology in order to help keep the total cost of care down and allow these rural hospitals to afford state-of-the-art technology that is equivalent to equipment available at larger tertiary hospitals. 

Through this effort, residents of communities served by Monida Shared Imaging’s MRI scanners have local access to this technology and can receive the care they deserve without having to travel significant distances to access similar equipment.  

The SIGNA Voyager is a wide-bore (70cm) MR system, which allows patients more room in the scanner and provides a patient-friendly design that maximizes comfort and versatility. AIR coils wrap patients like a blanket during the scan. This scanner also offers better image quality and reduced scan times due to AIR Recon DL, GE HealthCare’s deep learning image reconstruction technology. 

As a shared-service, mobile platform, the scanner will rotate through Three Rivers Health on a set schedule. Unlike CT scanners, which many rural hospitals own and use for emergencies such as trauma patients, most MRI scans are non-emergent and can be scheduled when the mobile scanner makes its weekly or bi-weekly rounds. 

Capable of acquiring diagnostic information significantly faster than older MRI systems, the scanner will enable physicians to improve the diagnosis of a wide range of conditions, including vascular disease, stroke, abdominal disorders, brain disorders, and musculoskeletal conditions in the knee, shoulder and other joints. 

One other advantage of MRI scans is MRIs utilize computers and magnetic fields, rather than radiation, to provide safe and non-invasive images of the human anatomy.