Top 5 Tips for Beginner MRI Techs

Welcome to another insightful episode of "A Couple of Rad Techs Podcast."

 I'm your host, Chaundria Singleton, and today we're diving into a topic that's crucial for anyone starting their journey as an MRI technologist. In this episode, "Top 5 Tips for Beginner MRI Techs," we’ll cover everything from the foundational importance of education, licensing, and certification to mastering the soft skills that will set you apart in this demanding field. We'll explore why keeping your licenses current is non-negotiable, how continuing education can elevate your career and the art of negotiating your worth in the workplace. Plus, I’ll share personal anecdotes on dealing with challenging situations—be it technical errors, patient anxiety, or difficult colleagues. So, whether you're a newbie or looking to up-level your MRI tech game, this episode is packed with practical advice and professional wisdom tailored just for you. Let's get started!

Education, licensing, MRI profession, certification, continuing education, career progression, Radiology Tech, negotiating value, workplace negotiation, patient care, specialized training, breast MRIs, pediatrics, diverse hospital settings, problem-solving skills, claustrophobic patients, technical errors, patient emergencies, sedated children, team-based approach, restricted medical information, abusive father incident, older scanning machines, clinical experience, certification boards, ARRT, ARMIT, state licensing, GPA importance, professional development.

Transcript

Chaundria: 0:40

Welcome to A Couple of Rad Techs. I am Chaundria, and today's conversation is all about how to become an MRI technologist. And it's going to be a very good conversation because you guys ask me all the time, how do you become an MRI technologist? And what does it take to actually master the skill, which of course helps you increase your money. So I've got my notes here. So if you see me looking down, I want to make sure I don't miss one thing because the next 10 minutes here is going to be life changing. So if you haven't also checked out the podcast recently, I interviewed MRI man. He is a well known MRI technologist on the YouTube platform. Be sure to check out that podcast there and let me know what you think. So let's get into it. What are we going to cover in this conversation? We are going to cover the education requirements that it takes to become an MRI technologist, as well as the clinical experience that you're going to need in order to master it. You just can't come off the street and decide to shoot MRIs, to take MRIs on people. You're also going to need third certification. That's going to be very important. And you're going to need licensing, whether it's at a state level or national level or both. Then you're going to need continuing education, which is what I'm doing right now because My Bynum year is coming up where I've got to get at least 24 credits. I have some already because I took a live course. I'm going to talk about that as well because live continuing education courses, I think are a game changer in mastering, becoming a MRI technology, technologist and staying a MRI technologist and really staying at the top of your game. Doing live. Education is so important. I'm going to tell you why and some of the things that I did, so be sure to stay tuned and let me know in the comments. Is there something that you just have not tried when it comes to your continuing education? I've got some ideas for you. Now let's get into it. But before we do, if you haven't already, be sure to subscribe to a couple of rad techs. And if you haven't checked out the podcast, be sure to do that as well. So let's get into the education requirements. I first went to school for radiologic technology. That to me is the best step, but that's not the only step. And it's not always the best situation or step for everyone. So my, advice is what works for you. Just know in the long run, that should be your plan. Don't do something because it's quick and fast. Oh, I can get an MRI certification in a year or two because I already have my bachelor's and I can go to this school and just take the MRI portion and I'll be an MRI tech. That's all I want to do. There are certain health issues that you may, hopefully not, but you may have. that may not allow you to be an MRI technologist. So now you have to go back to school for something, or you just can't work in the field anymore. And that's not good for anyone. And that's why I encourage people, if you can find a program for radiologic technology, go to school for that first. Then after you get your high school or equivalent, you can apply, get your associate's or bachelor's degree in radiologic technology. As I mentioned, you can also get it in MRI. There are a few schools that if you already have a degree. you can apply to go directly into MRI. And what is that called? That's called making MRI your primary pathway. So in medical imaging, the ARRT recognizes different pathways into the field. You have four, I think it's four pathways you can go to as a primary method. I'm going to list those out for you. Radiologic technology is one, which is going to open up 11 plus modalities at this point. When I started in radiology, there weren't 11 modalities. Now there are 11 and counting. Many other technology advances are opening up medical imaging. There was no PET scan when I started. Now there's PET scan. So nuclear medicine techs can do CT and PET scan, which opens them up to so much more money and opportunity and scheduling and just so many more skills. That's the beauty of our field, but if you don't go to radiology technology route, radiologic technology route is your primary pathway. Again, that opens up all the modalities to you. And there's one special one I'm going to leave at the end that is like top notch in our field and it is coming up. They started talking about it 20 years ago when I finished. It wasn't a thing then, but it was coming. And to see it now, you guys, you're going to be amazed. Stay tuned to the end. Be sure to let me know to remind myself. I'm going to remind myself. I'm not going to forget. Okay, let's get on. Number two, your other primary pathway could be nuclear medicine. So if you have a degree already, you go to school for nuclear medicine, you can make that your primary pathway. Yeah, a lot of people don't know that. Number three, ultrasound or sonography. You can make that your primary pathway. You don't have to go to x ray or radiologic technology school first in order to become an ultrasound technologist or a nuclear medicine technologist. Fourth, MRI. You do not have to go to school for radiology. That can be your primary pathway. Of course, you have to satisfy that school's requirements to be able to apply for any of these programs as your primary pathway. And fifth, I said four but it's five. Fifth, primary pathway is radiation therapy. Radiation therapy. There are people in the program for radiation therapy who went to school for biology and thought they wanted to be a doctor and they said X on that. I like radiation therapy and they realized what all they can do with it. I'm gonna talk in a video later about all the different directions you can go in radiation therapy. You can go to be a dosimetrist, medical physicist, all kind of things, especially if you're already coming in with your degree. degree, maybe a biology degree or something else. It really is a, it's a really good direction. Radiation therapists have that pathway, other pathways. So see, if you, if you haven't gotten it now, Medical imaging has so many different layers to it within one layer. Radiology technology, it's just not taking x rays at a clinic or a doctor's office of chest or bones. No, there are so many different little subcategories in it. You can work specifically in the operating room. You can work specifically in biopsies. You, you can do all types of things. There are so many things that go along with it. And we haven't even talked about the education direction or the clinical applications directions. Everything in our field is not patient care directed. So you got options, you guys. Clinical experience. So if you want to become a MRI tech, you got to get clinical experience. No matter if you do a primary pathway of MRI or radiologic technology. Clinical experience is required. You have to complete certain clinical rotations through facilities that your college has partnered with. There are a certain amount of exams, a certain amount of hours, and certain type of exams that you do have to complete. And not only do them, but you have to be competent in them. And that means that someone who is competent and a clinical instructor signs off that they have observed you a number of times Do these exams completely from beginning to end by yourself, not assisted. That's very important. Number three, certification. You do have to be certified. Most places will not hire technologists who do not have an ARRT or ARMRID, A R M R A R M I T. I don't know. A R M I T. I think that's what it is, but it's two certifications, two different boards that license MRI technologists. And you can have either one of those. Some facilities only take the A R R T as one of the oldest licensing boards. So, but many more are taking the ARMRT as well. But just make sure you have one if not both of them. I think both are great. Why not? But having them is going to allow you to be able to work in MRI. So you've got to pass those exams once you finish your education and your clinical. Now on top of that, some states require that you be licensed. There are about four or five states that are not licensure states and some states are trying to do away with the licensing. Would you want someone that is not licensed or educated taking your x rays or doing your CAT scans or doing your nuclear medicine studies? I'm gonna tell you in the state of Georgia, did you know there's no licensing for radiologic technologists or nuclear medicine technologists? Not that the hospital is going to hire anybody to do nuclear medicine or radiology technology. They still have to have the ARRT for hospitals because they have insurance and Medicare, which require that. But if it was just left up without that, who's to say who would be doing your exams? And even so, those states that are not licensed, there are people out there doing x rays who answer phones at the front desk. Something to think about. But this is what sets us apart. We have the education, we have the licensing, we have the certifications to back up that we know what we're doing. And we're not just button pushers. So if you want to up level yourself in this profession, you need to do all of these things and keep them current. That's my next part. Pay your license fees. Do not let your license fees lapse. I personally do not mainly work in a state that has a license, but I used to have five or six licenses when I used to travel heavily. I had Texas, Florida, Washington State, California, Arizona, Who else? New York, South Carolina, North Carolina. No, I didn't have North Carolina because they know how it was. South Carolina. It was South Carolina. They had another one. I had about five or six. Because your girl was traveling. And when they call for those jobs, you gotta be ready. Because it takes some time. I'm still waiting on my California license because I let it lapse during the pandemic. because I wasn't traveling and I was doing clinical applications. So I didn't plan on really going back into scanning, but you girl, some different things happened and money started looking good. And I'm like, I have no problem scanning. I like patients. I never really wanted to get out of the patient care side. That wasn't my thing. But when I got introduced to, up leveling myself in MRI with clinical applications, the education and other things. Education, you want to still work in the field. So you're current. So I still worked in the field and I was an educator and I was a clinical applications technologist. I felt like it made me a better technologist because I had the extra training. I had that extra book knowledge. I had the rubbing of the shoulders with other educators and really on top of things when it came to the physics part, the, the gradients, the, just the whole MRI portion. Now, in continuing education, this is what I want to talk about. It's so important that you do your continuing education. Don't just do something to where it's like, Oh, I could do that with my eyes closed. If you want to really master your MRI technology skills, this is what I have found has worked for me and opened up many doors. and also help my pay to increase. I don't know if you've seen my, my video before, I'm going to try to link it here where the one time I took a salary that really was insulting to me and the person was very insulting that offered it to me, very rude. And I tell that story because I wasn't up leveling myself when it came to my continuing education. I was doing a bare minimum, getting my 24 credit hours for the year. And I really wasn't doing anything, but that situation where I accepted pay. In a very insulting way. You gotta watch that video. Hopefully it helps you to understand your value and your worth. And really to see that you don't have to accept everything. And sometimes it's not about the money. It's about how you're going to be treated. People will offer you low amounts, but I'm just giving you an example. Someone may not be able to offer you a high paying job, but they can offer you education. They can offer you good vacation. They can offer you company 401k match. They can offer you a peaceful working environment, a schedule that you want. Those are the things I encourage people to negotiate. Really mastering MRI technologist is more than about just. doing the job. It's about negotiating your worth as well. And your worth comes from you up leveling yourself in all aspects of the profession. And that is learning negotiating, uh, techniques, learning what you know how to do and how to do what you know how to do better. That is very important and that's where continual education comes in. I try to get courses for continual education that I've never done before that are about exams, say something. I do a lot of breast MRIs, so I like to learn, uh, do continual education on breast, uh, continual education for MRI. I learn so much. Oh my goodness. I do the pediatrics part. I don't work in pediatrics anymore. I really miss it. But that's another place that you can really up level your skills because if you can identify certain things in PEDS and be able to do those, those, uh, unique exams that are in PEDS, cause there's nothing about a book in PEDS. Every brain in PEDS might be protocolled totally different by the radiologist. You're not going to do the same MRI brain on every pediatrics that comes through there because certain diseases that pediatric hospitals see are like cancers and tumors and growths that you just don't see. Children have things that you do not see in adult world. And you need a flare for this one, but you don't need a flare for that one. You need a, uh, MP Rage for this one, but you don't need one for that one. You need post for the, post contrast for this one, but you don't. So you start to learn why you need this and why you don't need this. I felt like I really up leveled my skills working in pediatrics because the radiologists are very involved with you. Explaining to you why you do this and why we're doing that and you have to reach out to them. Hey, this patient, if you see, and you have to be vigilant on your scans. You have to look at your scans and say, Oh, that doesn't look right. Let, before I get this patient off the table, let me call the radiologist because they got to look at it before, at least at the children's hospital I worked at. They have to look at the scan before you get those patients off the table. Why? Because most of those pediatric patients are sedated. They can't bring them back down because you forgot to do a scan or you didn't see this because you're not the radiologist and they got to sedate them again. Let me tell you, you learn. You learn so much. I encourage people, don't just work at the same hospital all the time. If you got your regular job at the hospital, go get a PR rant across the town at a trauma center or somewhere that's going to take you out of your comfort zone. That's going to really, really make you be that person. You know what I mean? Be that MRI technologist. That's my advice. So how to master those skills. I got some additional steps here. I'm going to read it from my notes. Number one, you want to practice. That goes along with what I just said. Work at a different hospital than where all your buddies work at, where, where you went to school at, because everybody knows your name, dun dun. You can tell that was my, uh, favorite show. But anyway, uh, you want to practice, and practice in places where it makes you uncomfortable, where people don't know you, where they're not gonna bail you out of every situation. You know, I see that and I've worked with technologists that they don't know how to, I remember working with this girl, she was sweet as pie, but she would not sit down and learn how to do an MRI abdomen. and everybody will bail her out of it. And I was like, I had to work one evening with her and I'm like, you're sweet and all, but I'm not going to do all these abdomens today. I am not. And if you ever work in a busy hospital, second shift, you get abdomens all day long. all day long. So, or they saved them from first shift to second shift. So all the abdomens come from the floor and I was not doing them all. And she's sitting over there doing brains and spines. No, ma'am. No, ma'am. So she didn't like working with me, but she learned because if you're going to work with me, everybody get paid, everybody here to do, do work and nobody gets to just sit back. But that helped me to also. learn how to work with people and deal with people because sometimes people get burned out in this field. I know I'm kind of going off of my additional steps, but I do want to say this. People get burned out because they never say anything. They sit there and allow themselves to be taken advantage of just like that situation. I could have sat there and not said anything. She was sweet as pie. She was easy to work with, but I was getting stressed out. You ever tried to do abdomens and you know, people throw up, people sick, they don't breathe. Abdomens are not like super easy. People don't breathe right. So you got motion everywhere. The arterial phase isn't good. So she really didn't. I had to teach her. And to me, if you're with someone who wants to teach you, learn, learn. So I had to learn how to work with her because it wasn't so much, she was a little lazy. But she also was used to being babied and she was used to, you know, going, Oh, I don't know. And everybody, Oh, it's okay. Just, and people didn't have patience to teach her. And she wasn't really pushing to try to learn either. So I was, had to learn to be very patient cause she really was a nice person. So you have to learn how to work with different coworkers. Some people just lazy. They're not going to learn. They're not interested in learning and they're not going to do it. And if they don't want to do it, those are people I don't want to work with. But there are people out there that don't have the confidence and that they have the right person teaching them. They will do it. So that's part of it too. Practicing is going to make you better at it. My husband is doing MRI now and he's like Abdomens is not his thing. But now he comes home after a month and he's like, Oh abdomens. I love abdomens, abdomens. And I gave him this advice. Everybody, he noticed this. He said everybody would work on a new machine. Of course, it's easy. It breathes for you. It does, you know, I mean, it's good. It's easy to work on the new stuff, but the old scanners is where you learn. That's where you learn because they don't do all that fancy stuff for you. You actually have to be a technologist in even more than what you do on the newer stuff. And One day one of his co workers came in and she said oh, I'm surprised you're back here on the odor machine He was like, yeah, it was empty and y'all have backlog of patients and he said to himself when he got home He said I was so happy that I took the initiative to go work on the unpopular Odor machine because it's teaching me really how to do these abdomens if you can breathe somebody inject contrast Watch the patient monitor everything at the same time and make sure you hit the arterial phase You You a bad mamma jamma. I'mma tell you, it, cause I don't trust the, uh, machine sometimes when you put the little marker on there for it to automatically pick up the contrast. That thing will pick it up sometimes and sometimes it won't. And now you gotta play catch up and try to go catch the arterioid and the radiologist like you missed it. You gotta call him back, patient mad. Oh, it's just too much. I like, I like both ways as long as the new way work, but you should know how to do the other way because a new way doesn't always work. That's the key. Practice makes perfect and you gain better experience when you practice. We're refining those skills, working on different scanners, working at different facilities. Where nobody knows your name. Do, do, do, do, do. Continual learning. Continual learning. I feel like that is what has helped me. I've never stopped learning. I wish I would have learned harder with cardiac though. I kind of gave up on that. It wasn't my thing. But I think I should have. Not I think. I know I should have worked harder and not given up on it. It just wasn't my thing. And now I look back like I should have really taken advantage of it. So I'm speaking from experience here. Continual learning. I have been able to do that. When I wanted to, I applied for the education job, I didn't feel qualified. I didn't feel like I should even do it, but I said, you know what, how do you know? Just go ahead and do it. And I applied for it and I interviewed for it. And they said I was the best candidate and I was there seven years. And I learned so much from that job. Uh, it was really a good experience for me. Um, yeah, it really was. Now you want to continue learning about new techniques in MRI protocols, equipment, You can do this either in journals, the ASRT if you're not a member. I am a member. My husband has always been a member. Uh, when he found out I wasn't a member, he looked at me like, are you not a member of our association? And if you've already not seen it, check out this video. We went to the museum, Radiologic Technology, Medical Imaging and Radiation Therapists. We have a museum and you can look at it here. We did a nice little quick video to show you all the things radiology has to offer and kind of educate the public and our other professionals in the field about our beautiful museum. I was so excited to go to that museum and I had, we love museums. We love museums. My husband and I go to museums. When I was single, I went to Italy and I was in museums and castles all day long. My friend that went with me was like, Oh, you so boring. I was like, girl, I eat and go to museums, eat and go to museums, eat and go to museums. That's me. I can stay there looking at all the paintings on the wall. I go to art gallery. I love museums. We went to the, um, what's the man name? I forgot. I have to tell y'all if I get a chance, I'll put it in the comments. But we went to this art, we just sat on the bench and just relaxed. It was so much fun. But anyway, specializations. I cannot say this enough. Specialized. And you can specialize in MRI. They have, I was in a course recently with a girl, they have MRI in the operating room. It's happening, y'all. You can specialize in MRI. There's breasts. I remember working at a place, they did so many breasts. And breast biopsies that they just needed two texts that just stayed up in their ear and they did breast all day long. Yes. Oh, You watch me all the time on TikTok. Thank you. Right. Yeah. So I am over on TikTok as well. And I enjoy my little short form over there. I said, I was not planning on being on social media, but I did it with another business and that was what I was on. And my husband was like, you should talk about radiology. And I'm like, nobody wants to hear about radiology. And it's so funny because I forgot that I was live. So when that comment popped up. I was a little shocked, but I forgot I'm doing this live. Okay. Well, so I'm going to continue cause I'm wrapping up specialization. You want to specialize. You can be a cardiac MRI tech. I have a friend that was the manager of a cardiac MRI and CT and That's all she did all day was cardiac. She had a whole team of technologists and all they did was cardiac. That's amazing You can specialize in and and how do you do that? You've got to do well in where you are. You got to continue learning. You got to be certified And when you do your continued education credits, be sure to try to go to live courses. You have different MRI safety. That's a huge topic now. I think there's a course right now going on. for MRI safety. Be sure to come to some of these events and go sit live. You get credit hours for them. You, it's a education expense. Talk to your CPA about how you can write some of this stuff off. This part of your education, y'all. It's worth it. And you can get certified on some of these things and think what if your company can pay for it, that's even better. Because when I go to certain things, I'm usually the only one that the company is not paying for it because I contract myself out. What made you want to do MRI? Oh, it went away. Sorry. What made me want to do MRI? I'll answer that right after this. Um, so I usually have to pay for my own because I contract myself out to all of my jobs. So I don't work for a facility. I am my own facility or my own company. So my company pays for me to go out. So your company that you work for can do the same thing. All you got to do is ask. You'll be surprised. If you ask now if you don't ask they don't have to tell and they have to be fair They have to be fair. So if you express interest that you want to go to Siemens for the next education. I remember, I'll give you an example. I worked at a place when I was as PRM and as a PRM, I didn't get the education benefits like going off to North Carolina for the Siemens training, but there were about three or four techs. And most of them didn't, weren't interested in it. And I expressed my interest. They had some more education credits and I said, well, hey, since none of them want to use it, I like to use it. To be fair, I appreciated the manager. He had to go around to each one of the full time people and ask them, did they want the education? And they said, no. And so he said, well, I've asked everybody. I have to run it through HR to make sure because usually we don't give it to PRNs because I have to ask all the PRNs. And of course, now all of a sudden, the full timers are like, wait, we want it. And then they start fighting amongst themselves who want it. Like, I opened up a whole can of worms. But it goes to show that people don't know that the education can be paid for by your employer. But you gotta ask, because they're not going to tell you. They're not going to tell you, or they keep giving it to the same person over and over. And you just think, Oh, I'm not management. I can't get it. That's not the case. So you don't always have to pay for it. That's my advice. How did I get into MRI? I got into it because I started in radiologic technology. I finished. I won the top technical award. So don't think I can't do x ray. I was really good at x ray. I was really, really good at x ray, but I knew I wanted to explore all the other things that medical imaging has. So I applied for radiation therapy school. I didn't get in. Applied again, didn't get in. They gave me a job at CT right out of school. Love CT. I still love, I still do and love CT to this day. Love CT. I met an applications technologist. We became friends, still friends to this day. Your GPA does not matter. It does not matter. Somebody just commented on my TikTok 2. 0 GPA and they got accepted into the program. Your personality means a lot. You got a bad personality and a good GPA? It's not. You probably won't pass the interview section. Um, but yeah, so that's what I said about the GPA. But yeah, so I forgot what I was saying. I'm so sorry. Oh my goodness. I am so sorry. I forgot. Maybe it'll come back to me. But I that's, oh, I got into it because I went to ct, started doing CT for many years, and then I was working contract working all these, uh, second, third, first shift, and a particular place I was at. They could not seem to get anybody to wanna work in MRI. There were a few characters over there. If you ever worked in MRI. We have some personalities, not we, I don't, but at least I don't think I do. But everybody don't like everybody, so, you know, but I think I'm a pretty easy person to work with. I do my work. Keep my head down. I, I, I lay out talk, but I, I go to work to work. Um, but they have some personalities over there that were very hard to work with. Me and another girl, we, we made it through and we're still friends to this day. Um, one lady retired, the other guy. He passed away, but he turned out to be a really nice guy. Once you got through his layers and the other girl got fired for putting needles in a trash can. Yeah. People crazy. Yeah. She was very hard to work with. She was a mean, bitter bit. And I think she was the problem, but she, but they allowed her because I almost gave up even working with her. She was awful, awful. The other two weren't that bad, but she was awful. And she was only awful to me. Anybody that tried to come through there, but they, they were like, they couldn't, men could not deal with it. She did not like men at all. Oh my goodness. She couldn't tell you what to do. She, she could boss the one guy around, but the rest of the men that came in, they were like, I can't work with her. I don't know where she is today. But that's why I say, you know, you have to just decide this is what I want to do. So I wind up going in there and when they saw I could deal with them. But my problem was I couldn't pass the registry. So it took me three tries. I passed the MRI, MRI registry and became MRI certified. And the rest is history. And I started to hone other skills. So for me, it was not only knowing that Philips scanner that I was on, but also learning every scanner. Because when I had a job somewhere else, they had a GE. Then I took a travel job and they told me they had a GE. Well, they didn't have a GE. And all I knew how to work on was a Siemens, a Toshiba, excuse me, a Philips, Toshiba, and a GE. When I got there, in the middle of the night, brand new hospital, nobody was there, but the nuclear medicine tech, who was no help. There was a Siemens scanner. I didn't even know how to turn it on. It took me an hour to turn the thing on. That was my introduction to Siemens. So that's what I say. But now I became a clinical applications technologist for Siemens. Well, not for Siemens. I worked for myself, but I sent myself This is the other thing about continuing education I pay for myself to go to Siemens and take the clinical applications training on one of their scanners Yeah, it was very worth it. I wind up seeing my My ability to get more contracts as a clinical applications increase because I felt like my skills and my were better once I paid for that live training to go to Siemens and learn how to do that. My skills, I felt more confidence. I really felt like I had all the tools I needed to go now and do these clinical applications jobs even better. And I started booking way more jobs until the pandemic came. And that's what, stop, stop that. Now I'm tired of traveling, so I don't think I want to get back into it unless the money's right. I sure would. Uh, problem solving skills and patient care. That is so important. MRI technologists, being an MRI technologist, I have never ever had to use my problem solving skills in any other modality as much as I do MRI. Now I did an x ray and CT as well, but MRI is a whole nother beast because of the way you scan and the way it gathers images. So, you scan Axial and you reformat in CT into Sagittal and Coronal, so you just scan Axial, it don't matter. MRI, if your positioning is not right, I mean CT counted too, but MRI, if you got somebody in the cast, you just, you know, You just can't change it, and your coronal gonna look like a sagittal, and when you try to angle an MRI on certain scanners, it can flip it, and you look like you're in a coronal, but you're not really in a coronal. It's confusing. It, my husband came on the other day and was like, oh my goodness, that thing kept flipping, and it was a coronal, but it looked like a sagittal. I had to correct the girl's scan. She scanned the person. The radiologist said the person gotta come back, cuz she scanned all coronals. It was supposed to be an axial, three coronals, and a sagittal. That sagittal was a corona because she missed and flipped it too far and didn't realize it because it looks like you're setting up a corona, but it's actually a sagittal. It, it's a lot of problem solving. And then you got people on top of that that are claustrophobic, you got phones ringing, you got, it's a lot going on in MRI. Don't let somebody have a reaction to contrast, don't let them be sedated, don't let you, the respiratory therapist be in there, the ICU nurse, it can get really, really crowded. And a lot going on. I'm just saying, you gotta have problem solving skills because problems occur. I had a patient in the hallway having a seizure one time, patient on the table claustrophobic, family members yapping in the waiting room, which is attached. Ugh. And phone ringing, I was by myself, had to call the med team because I didn't know it was a seizure. I thought he was having a stroke. I didn't know. It was one of the weirdest seizures I've ever seen. And he had never been having them before. So even a nurse, when I called the nurse over here and called the med team, she was like, what in the world is going on? My patient didn't have it. But MRI can cause people, certain sequences can cause patients to have seizures. to bring on certain things while they're in the scanner. That's why we have to be able to solve problems really quickly. And we can't allow anyone in that room until we get the patient out. So we have to undock the table. If you have an undockable table or move them off the table that's not undockable onto a stretcher, MRI safe stretcher, and then pull them out the room. So now emergency services could get to them. It's a lot. It's a lot. Uh, and patient care. We really have to focus on patient care because majority of our people are anxious and that anxiety can present as I remember one morning, back to back, I had two people and I had to call security. I'm like, they want to fight me. I don't want to fight. I don't want to fight. I'm just here to scan. And it was over, like, one guy was like, you didn't take my necklace off. You're supposed to take it off in the dressing room. Like, it was so weird. I can't tell you the rest of it because, you know, I I can't tell you the rest of the story, but it was so weird why he was so angry, violently angry at me, to where I was picking up the phone, I'm like, security, come get him, cause I would not be back here with anybody threatening me over something so stupid. But turned out, so security watched, I agreed to go ahead and do the scan, if he calmed down, he finally calmed down, kinda, acting a nut. got on the table and turns out he's claustrophobic. So that's what I'm saying, like you have to be able to, and then we was best friends after that. Cause I got them through the scan. Like one thing I know how to do and I have been able to work on through the years is my patient care. And that is making sure people do not harm themselves in a scan or harm myself when it comes to anxiety. Cause it can go out. I've seen the anxiety make people. get arrested in the hospital because they get so anxious and worked up and get aggressive and security is like, we don't have time for it. You come in here threatening people. I don't care how scared you are this MRI scanner, you're going to go to jail and you're going to be banned from this hospital. Things like that I have seen in MRI. People get, you have to really employ your patient care skills to identify with, it's like a nurse. You don't know if that patient is being aggressive because diabetic the sugar is too low or if they just mean so you have to Kind of assess and figure out. Okay. Now it's the sugar. Let's get them. Let's get their blood sugar balance They'll be better or they need to be in handcuffs and be be on out of here to jail. I Love working with kids if I ever went back full time, it would definitely be children's It would definitely be children's because most of your patients are sedated. Majority of the patients are sedated. If you work second shift, the bigger kids most of the time are not sedated. They come in for routine stuff, but most kids have a little drugs in them if they're not fully sedated. So nobody's moving. The machine breathes for them. Like, and the most of the people that work in children's, even your coworkers for the most part, You don't have all that foolishness because most, it's, it's just a different atmosphere when you working with people who understand that they're dealing with very sick children. You're so busy at a children's hospital. There was very few times there was downtime. Uh, but you're very busy at a children's hospital. You work as a team because you have nurses back there because, you know, doctor, there's always a lot of people in the MRI department. So you have to always be on your P's and Q's because safety is important and people are always coming and going like. It's a fortress, and any MRI department I've, I've worked in that's like a fortress is a children's. Because there's so much going on back there. Because you have children that are sedated and cannot speak. You have teams of people. You have very critical kids coming. You have kids that come in from the ER with hips broken cause they've been playing or a lot of child abuse cases. We have to also be in our P's and Q's and in children's hospitals because I found more at children's hospital than adults. You have situations of abuse. So some children will have in their chart where it's blacked out and you have to put a code in to be able to see that information because the family is under protective care away from whoever it is that's causing them harm. Uh, what else? There's just a lot of situations that children's is very different and it takes, they don't hire everybody. Yeah, it is a shame. Um, I had a situation when I first was there, uh, years ago and it was abusive father, but they didn't know the father was abusive, but you could tell something was going on because the mother would just stand up that quiet, the baby. was harmed and I was trying to do the x ray, we had to wrap him up. And a dad like bucks up at me because I needed him to step out of the room. He didn't want to step out of the room and just leave the mother in there because I guess he was afraid she was going to say something. And I was like, well, you can't be in the room. I really wasn't suspecting anything because I'm just like, you can't be in the room. We've got everybody got to walk out and stand behind the shield for radiation. And he stood up next to me and was like, You not gon tell me nothin I'm like, and I'm young in my 20s, so, you know, really, like, I don't know who you think you talkin to. He could've bopped me right upside the head. Um, if we weren't in a public place, he probably wouldn't have wiped. I saw her face, like this man was about to lose it. And my coworker ran and got the other guys, cause, you know, x rays a lot of people. And I'm, I'm standing there like, I am not scared of you. And I wasn't scared of him. I really was trying to figure out like, wait, why is this guy bucking up at me? Cause I need everybody to stay. I'm stepping out the room too. None of us are going to get radiated. Cause I would do the rap of the baby. and you know that way nobody could have to stay in the room. I wasn't the type to like to hold people if I don't have to and get radiated and I would make sure my co workers didn't get experienced exposed to that as well and he was just so aggressive so the guys had to come in they were like dude you got to get out so then they put him all the way out because He couldn't take on both of them and we wound up calling security and then they found out once they got the mother separated that he was abusive and even abused the baby. That's why I say you really gotta, working at Children's, you have to be able to handle a whole gamut of things. And you have to be able to, what does it go back to? Problem solving skills and patient care. You still have to deliver the patient care, solve the problem, which is get the test done, and sometimes you gotta fake the funk and not let people know that you onto them, that you are onto them. I'm trying to see the chat while I'm talking, but. There we go. No, I don't know. This is my first time going live on my phone, so I'm sorry y'all, but I can't see the chat. I know you got questions, but I have gone over my time. This is supposed to be a 10 minute video, and it is almost 40 minutes, so I appreciate all the comments. I need to do a live more often, so I will be doing that. Hope you guys enjoyed. Hope you guys learned something about how to really master being an MRI technologist, and what it is that we do in the field of medicine. MRI. If you want to learn more about our field of radiologic technology, MRI, radiation therapy, medical imaging, be sure to check out one of these videos in my playlist. Have a good one.