Mohawk College and McMaster University’s latest collaboration for the new Centre for Integrated and Advanced Medical Imaging (CIAMI) may offer a chance to cut wait times for MRI’s in Hamilton.

The CIAMI is set to provide a space for educational training, imaging research and increased MRI access for patients.

The centre will additionally be partnering with affiliated hospital systems at Hamilton Health Sciences and St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton to enable a new model of training with a “living lab.”

The facility located at the Mohawk-McMaster Institute of Applied Health Sciences building on the university’s main campus will be home to the newly installed advanced MRI unit, only the second of its kind in Canada.

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The schools say an advanced MRI unit provides the opportunity to cut wait times and potentially double the speed of service to those patients requiring MRI scans.

The centre is set to remain the site of continuing research, with innovative technology and artificial intelligence available for researchers to enable cutting-edge discoveries.

Paul O’Byrne, dean and vice-president of the Faculty of Health Sciences at McMaster University, calls the centre “win-win-win for Hamilton.”

O’Byrne emphasized that “besides offering research opportunities with state-of-the-art technologies and first-class education for students, it will boost the community’s access to advanced health care.”

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