Last Updated on: 27th July 2025, 04:03 pm
We were going to call this “MRI in the Mourning”, but I like my title better. Even so, have a song.
I heard about this story of a dude with a weight training chain around his neck getting sucked into an MRI machine. I can only stammer and gape and wonder how this was allowed to happen! I feel like this could have been stopped at so many points, and it could be definitely stopped by the MRI tech! Why wasn’t it?
I have had two MRI’s, and the staff made a very big point of asking in many and varied ways if I had any metal in or on me. I had to fill out forms, get asked questions, get asked questions again, lock any metal up that I might have had, get asked some more questions, and then and only then was I brought into the room where the MRI was, the lair of the snuffling beast. Dammit I can’t find just that noise it makes when it’s at rest, but in my twisted mind, I pictured some kind of beast, tightly coiled and waiting for the signal to spring into action. There is no denying that I’m weird.
Anyway, this is what went down according to the story.
- Adrienne Jones-McAllister was having an MRI on her knee.
- She had had previous MRI’s at this facility.
- Her husband Keith had accompanied her to her scans before.
- For reasons that are not explained, Keith just walks around with a 20-lb weight training chain around his neck.
- The tech, not sure if it’s the same tech, but techs, have noticed the chain previously, commenting “Oooo that’s a really big chain!”
- At the end of the scan, it was requested that Keith come in and help his wife off the table. This is Keith, the fella with the weight-training chain, and the table is the MRI table.
- Keith is summoned by the tech,
- aaaaaand…doom occurs. Keith is pulled into the MRI machine, waves goodbye and goes limp.
- They got him out, but he died later.
How did that happen? The lion’s share of the blame goes to the clinic and tech who didn’t stop him and his giant metal chain from approaching the *magnetic* resonance imaging machine. Why did Keith even need to come in the room? Why wasn’t the tech helping her down? But if the tech needed hubby to come in, for the love of Pete, tell him to take off the chain!
But I am kind of surprised that neither of them realized, especially since they’ve been there before, that metal and magnets don’t mix and he should take it off. I have met people who don’t know what an MRI is, but those people have never had one. This woman has, and her husband has been there.
What a completely preventable tragedy.