Whitman Hospital sets imaging tour

The Whitman Hospital and Medical Center in Colfax is ready to show off its new MRI unit.

The 12,000-pound unit has been in operation at the hospital since March after having been hoisted to the hospital’s second floor with the use of a large crane in January. It replaced a mobile unit which had been in place for several years.

In March, Laurie Gronning, public relations specialist for the hospital, detailed some of the improvements the new machine will offer.

“It will be improved wait times, and it will help those who feel claustrophobia because of the wider opening,” she said. “And there will be music that is specific to what the patient likes from Pandora. It will improve the experience from the beginning to the end.”

The second floor MRI suite includes a patient waiting area, dressing rooms and privacy windows.

The MRI unit, a Toshiba Vantage Titan 1.5T MRI, will not be the only thing the hospital will be showing off at the open house it has planned next week.

“People can come in and see the MRI unit and actually all the department,” said Debbie Hoadley with the imaging department. “We’ll be letting the public come in and see what the imaging department does.”

Also on the list to show off will be the new Hologic Bone Densitometry (DXA) scanner, the digital 3D mammography unit the hospital acquired last year, the CT scanner, x-ray unit and the ultrasonography unit.

Hoadley said images will be up during the open house to show attendees the quality of the images at the imaging department before much of the technology was in place there. She said the walk through will start in a waiting area, where a short video will explain what a DXA scanner is, and proceed through the entire department before ending at the MRI unit.

Funding awarded to the hospital through United States Development of Agriculture Rural Development under the 2014 Distance Learning and Telemedicine Grant Program in the amount of $500,000 helped to pay for the MRI unit, as well as the 3D mammography machine. The hospital funded the remaining amount for the units after the grant money.

The open house tour next week is slated for Tuesday, Nov. 8, from 5 to 7 p.m. It is free, and refreshments will be provided by the hospital dietary staff. The event is planned as part of National Radiologic Technology Week, observed Nov. 6-12.