Texas Children's Hospital announced it will be the first children's hospital in the U.S. to use a PET/MRI scanner (Philips Healthcare).
The scanner is located in a new imaging facility at the Texas Children's Pavilion for Women, which opened on April 29. The hospital built new MRI and nuclear medicine facilities to extend services in functional and molecular imaging.
In addition to the PET/MRI scanner, the new imaging facility has a PET/CT scanner, two SPECT cameras, and a SPECT/CT system. The center also incorporates a thematic audio and lighting system (Ambient, Philips), and it has a toy model of an MRI scanner, called Kitten Scanner, in the waiting room for children to play with to help alleviate their anxiety about the machine.
