MRIs don’t resonate with local patients

With news of the Pilbara’s first mobile MRI service closing at the end of this month, patients have come out claiming they were never informed of the regional service.

As revealed by the North West Telegraph, the Global Diagnostics mobile MRI service is set to close at the end of this month after it failed to attract enough clients, with the company that owns it, Integral Diagnostics, saying its inability to gain a Medicare licence was to blame.

Exmouth resident Ray Crook said despite going through the process of receiving an MRI for more than two months, he had only found out about the Pilbara service when he saw it in the media.

“No one has been telling us about it — I know we don’t have many permanent doctors up here but the hospital should have known and told us,” he said.

“It’s a complete lack of communication.

“It should have been widely advertised there was one up here.”

Mr Crook said he would rather have travelled to Port Hedland for the service rather than Perth as he had been doing because the cost was similar.

WA Country Health Service Pilbara regional director Margi Faulkner said if a patient required an MRI in the Pilbara they were referred to the closest Medicare eligible MRI unit or offered the choice to attend a privately run service.

“Patients are informed of their options to attend local or Perth-based MRI services along with any associated costs when seeing their doctor,” she said.

“Many of the MRIs booked in Perth are done so to coincide with specialist treatment or complex care not available in the Pilbara.”