Who Was The First Person To Be Scanned Using MRI?

One of the main medical imaging tools that has become vital for helping to diagnose and plan potential medical procedures is magnetic resonance imaging, but unlike computed tomography scans, its history is far more condensed and characterised by fairly rapid progress.

An MRI scan is a common tool used to diagnose a wide variety of medical conditions using strong magnetic fields and radio waves to create three-dimensional images of the body without using radiation.

Outside of people who are claustrophobic, have metal implants or have a pacemaker that will not allow them to enter an MRI scanner, they are often a preferred tool for scanning the human body, particularly when planning cancer treatments.

Unlike CT, which was theorised half a century before it was first attempted, the discovery of the potential for MRI to distinguish tumours from normal tissue was in 1971. Within three years the first image had been taken of Dr Andrew Maudsley’s finger by Sir Peter Mansfield, and within four years of that, the first full-body scan of a human being was made.

This scan, undertaken by Raymond Damadian, Larry Minkoff and Michael Goldsmith, was interesting, but it would take another three years for this concept to be taken further and actually be used in the treatment of a disease.

A team led by Professor John Mallard used an MRI machine on 28th August 1980 to scan a patient for the first time to actively look for disease at the University of Aberdeen. The scan found a chest tumour, which had spread to the patient’s bones, alongside an abnormal liver.

Whilst the theory behind MRI’s effectiveness had been largely proven by his point, this scan and the full-body machine that performed it led to the widespread application and introduction of MRI throughout the 1980s, fundamentally transforming diagnostics in the process.