A third MRI machine is on its way to Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre (RVH) after new funding was unveiled today by the provincial government and staff at the Barrie hospital.
The province announced Tuesday morning that it is providing an additional $800,000 to the local hospital to go along with the money raised through the RVH Foundation, which would see the machine arrive sometime within the next two years.
RVH president and CEO Gail Hunt told BarrieToday the MRI machines cost around $2 million and today’s announcement will help cover operational costs.
“This funding will be added to what we raised through the RVH Foundation, and will be added to help pay the staff to work the hours, which costs about $800,00 a year," Hunt said.
"Through the foundation and community fundraising, it is up to us to come up with the money to actually purchase the machine and renovations to make room for it," she added. "More room is needed, crucially, as we are already bursting at the seams.”
MRI is short for magnetic resonance imaging and the machines create images of the body using a large magnet and radio waves. Using non-invasive technology, they can produce detailed medical images of almost every internal structure in the human body, including organs, bones, muscles, and blood vessels.
RVH provides 70 per cent of the total MRI scans in the region. There are currently more than 7,300 people on the wait-list, with 470 of those being cancer-related patients.
“Our region will continue to experience rapid population growth over the next decade, putting additional strain on our current resources,” said Dr. Raj Grover, RVH's medical director of medical imaging. “Today’s announcement is exactly what the doctor ordered. A third MRI will allow our medical imaging department to expand services, reduce wait-times and provide optimal timely patient care for the most complex and urgent cases for patients now and in the future.”
Similar funding announcements were made last month at Georgian Bay General Hospital (GBGH) in Midland and at Collingwood General and Marine Hospital (CGMH).
According to Ontario Health data collected in November 2021, the average wait-time for the lowest-priority patients is about 65 days. The target is 28 days.
“This is especially important, given that we house the cancer centre here in the building," Hunt said. "We really want to be within provincial standards for getting MRI requests done.
"This (new addition) will allow us to become a little quicker with our patients and, of course, new technology is always quicker than previous technology," she added. "Getting this up and going will be a game-changer for our cancer centre in particular.”
Barrie-Innisfil MPP Andrea Khanjin echoed that sentiment.
“This isn’t just a bricks-and-mortar announcement or a machine announcement; it is a game changer for our community,” Khanjin said. “The one thing that none of us can buy is time. But if we have the ability to have the MRI scanner where people can plan their life and get a diagnosis early on, while being able to stay home and not drive to another city.”
Hospitals in Barrie, Midland, Collingwood, and Muskoka are among 27 facilities in the province to have received operational funding for MRI machines.
