The state has given Central Baptist Hospital the green light to install two new magnetic resonance imaging scanners (MRIs) - one at the Diagnostic Center at the corner of Nicholasville Road and Southland Drive, and the other in the burgeoning Hamburg area of Lexington.

In August, the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services approved certificates of needs for the two MRIs. Installation will soon be underway for one in the Diagnostic Center, in space reserved for future expansion. The second MRI will be located in a building - not yet under construction - on Alysheba Way. Plans for the building, which will be leased by Central Baptist, call for inclusion of other diagnostic modalities, such as CT and X-ray, to be housed there as well.

The Diagnostic Center MRI will be open as soon in early 2005, and the MRI in the Alysheba building is scheduled to be up and running later next year.

The additional MRIs will help fill a growing need for the diagnostic tool. "Our current MRI quickly reached capacity, and the indications are growing for MRI," said Kay Ross, R.N., M.S.N., A.O.C.N., vice president, oncology/clinical support. "We’re already doing breast MRI, and we’re moving into cardiac MRI in addition to the indications that currently exist. So the demand and usage are both there."

Additional MRIs are in line with our strategic plan, which included reaching out to our community by making outpatient services easier and more accessible for residents of Fayette and contiguous counties. Although the fastest-growing zip code in Lexington (40509) is located in Hamburg, few medical services are located there. It’s also easily accessible to the interstate, and other area counties. "This is part of a coordinated initiative to reach out into that area of town with some new services," Ross said.

The additional locations of MRIs also will help free up the MRI located in Building D for more inpatient and specialized use.

The Diagnostic Center has been met with an overwhelmingly positive response from patients and physicians alike. Now, with the addition of an MRI, it will offer a full complement of diagnostic imaging tools, including digital X-ray, CT and ultrasound.

The MRI unit at the Diagnostic Center will be a Siemens Magnetom Avanto, the latest technology offered in the area, said Bill Broaddus, director of radiology. The machine can scan in three parallel planes simultaneously, and is significantly quieter than current MRIs. "It has lightweight coils that can be placed over the patient, as well as coils under the patient that a technologist can place all at once, if needed, to allow the tech to focus on various parts of the patient’s body without moving the patient," Broaddus said.