Brockville General Hospital’s President and CEO could hardly contain his excitement Thursday morning as the province announced a multi-million dollar funding commitment for a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machine in Brockville, Ont.
“This is great, it’s just great,” Nick Vlacholias said. “It allows the community to have services locally, instead of traveling down the 401 or going up the 416 to Ottawa.”
Currently, should Brockville residents require an MRI, they have to travel to Kingston, Cornwall or Ottawa.
Leeds-Grenville, Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes MPP Steve Clark said it’s taken years to get to this point, as an earlier proposal to bring an MRI machine to Brockville failed.
He’s glad to finally be able to move forward with the project.
“We were able to take that former proposal and put it to the officials at the ministry of health,” Clark said.
The province and the hospital will split the costs of the project.
So far, it is estimated that the imaging equipment and necessary construction for the MRI suite will cost somewhere in the neighbourhood of $6 million.
“But that’s in today’s dollars,” Vlacholias said, “and construction costs are somewhat fluctuating right now. So once we have determined costs, and once we go out to tender, we’ll have the final costs.”
The new MRI suite will be comprised of an addition to the hospital, to be built where the current courtyard is. It’s expected to be fully operational by the end of 2023.