Overview

The focus of this workshop will be on MR safety practices as experienced by MR clinics worldwide. This will include education on practical safety topics like MR safety infrastructure and management but also upcoming topics like implant safety and MR safety in interventional settings. The workshop will also be a forum for clinicians, scientists, and engineers to discuss the latest developments (e.g. gadolinium safety, safety of active implants, etc.) with respect to MR safety and discuss current & future safety standards and testing methods.

This workshop will also offer hands-on sessions for participants on practical MR safety aspects, featuring prominently the scanning of patient with implants. These sessions anticipate the increasing number of patients with implants encountered in MRI clinics. There will also be a workflow and infrastructure, patient setup, and scanning session. With this setup, the aim is to attract particularly technologist/radiographers who experience ever-growing MR safety issues in their clinics daily. Parallel to the practical hands-on MR safety session are hands-on sessions focused more towards scientists and engineers discussing and demonstrating latest development in modeling and implant testing methods.

The workshop will also have a dedicated session that discusses MR safety for special settings such as pediatric MRI, intra-operative MRI, and MR-guided radiation therapy. This will be completed by tours to an MRI guided radiation therapy system and the imaging section of the pediatric oncologic hospital in Utrecht.

Lastly, the workshop will feature presentations and discussions led by topic experts. Additionally, there will be abstracts for both scientific and clinical posters as well as power pitches.

Target Audience

This workshop is targeted toward clinicians, physicists, engineers, students, technologists/radiographers, regulators, industry representatives, and everyone else interested in or responsible for MR safety from all over the world.

Educational Objectives

Upon completion of this activity, participants should be able to:

• Explain best practices for patient management and MR safety infrastructure;
• Provide hands-on training on practical MR safety aspects;
• Recognize the latest techniques to perform MRI safety testing;
• Analyze MR safety labeling for implanted devices and describe implementation on clinical scanners;
• Describe both traditional and emerging MR safety challenges (e.g., gadolinium = traditional; RF safety = emerging); and
• Identify and/or explain new technologies and techniques for addressing emerging MR safety issues.