Commonwealth Healthcare Corporation Photo: wikicommons
The Commonwealth Healthcare Corporation (CHCC) in the Northern Mariana Islands has received a grant of more than US$6 million to allow it to acquire a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machine.
The grant comes from the Helmsley Charitable Trust, which decided this year to expand its Rural Healthcare Program to the CNMI and American Samoa.
The Trust has, over the last 15 years, funded over $700m in eight rural states in the US mainland.
CHCC chief executive Esther Muña thanked Helmsley Charitable Trust and said the MRI will be a real game-changer for the hospital, saying that having no MRI was one of the challenges that CHCC has.
"Hundreds of our patients must travel off-island for a service that most people in the United States provide their own communities," she said.
"Having an MRI on island will improve our ability to diagnose and monitor various medical conditions including (but not limited to) neurological issues, cardiovascular diseases, and more."
CNMI governor Arnold Palacios said the equipment "has been badly needed and we have not been able to find the funding for it".
The Helmsley Charitable Trust said patients currently must travel 2000 miles to Hawaii for standard MRIs.
"This expansion aims to do the same for the residents of these US territories [CNMI and American Samoa] with both grants providing funds for the first MRI machines for the islands.
"These grants, totaling almost $10 million, also provide both Islands with x-ray units and ultrasound equipment to ensure that medical providers are able to properly diagnose and treat patients."
Magnetic resonance imaging is a medical imaging technique used in radiology to form pictures of the anatomy and the physiological processes inside the body.
MRI scanners use strong magnetic fields, magnetic field gradients, and radio waves to generate images of the organs in the body.