Bojan Banko, MD at Center for Radiology and MRI at Clinical Center of Serbia – Whole body MRI scan important for early detection of any disease

Doctors constantly warn us that preventive medical examinations can save our lives. However, a large number of diseases, especially fatal ones, are still detected by accident.

On the occasion of the World Health Day, celebrated on April 7, the Ministry of Health of Serbia organized the Open Door Day at all medical institutions in the country. All citizens, including those without medical insurance, were able to get ENT and cardiology checks, get their blood pressure checked, have an ECG, or check their blood sugar.

Whether prevention is the best cure and how important MRI is for an early detection of a disease are some of the topics we discussed with Bojan Banko, an MD at the Center for Radiology and MRI at the Clinical Center of Serbia.

eKapija: To what extent are preventive medical examinations important to human health?

– A proper diagnosis is crucial to a proper and timely treatment. An early detection makes even very serious diseases treatable in many cases. Preventive examinations are therefore our best chance of not detecting a disease too late, but at the moment when the symptoms are either not yet present or are not strong enough, causing us to neglect them.

Annual general medical examinations, which used to be taken for granted, are now unfortunately a privilege of only certain professions or employees working at profitable companies. Such companies provide their employees with general medical examinations at least once a year. In many developed countries, they found a long time ago that preventive medicine pays off the most in every sense.

eKapija: What is the treatment success rate if certain diseases are detected on time?

– Concrete data exist only if certain diseases groups are observed individually. However, what's certain is the fact that, for example, the detection of the early signs of a malignant diseases thanks to preventive medical examinations leads to a full recovery and a considerable extension of the five-year survival rate.

eKapija: What is the advantage of MRI?

– MRI is a non-invasive radiology diagnostics method which enables the most precise visualization of all tissues and organs and with that the diagnostics of a large number of diseases – oncology, systemic diseases, and is nearly inevitable in diagnosing various wrist injuries and other soft tissue issues. It is the only absolutely harmless diagnostics device, without any radiation, making it fully suitable for children and pregnant women.

Thanks to its high soft tissue resolution, MRI gives the best image of tissues and organs and any potential changes in them. This, for example, allows us to localize these changes, see how they relate to the surrounding structures, blood vessels, and what its characteristics are. All this information is then used by doctors and surgeons to determine how the patient is to be treated.

eKapija: How important is MRI when it comes to preventive medical examinations?

– MRI has existed for several decades now, but its importance in the past 10-15 years has been such that, today, dozens of millions of people are examined this way worldwide each year. The number grows by around 10-15% each year. What very few people here know is that, in the past few years, whole body MRI scans, in the form of preventive screening programs, have become very important in the world. Even here, certain private clinics use MRI for general preventive examinations/screenings.

If we want to control our health without any harmful influences, we can get laboratory test and an MRI whole body screening done once a year.

The purpose of such examinations is prevention among the healthy populace. In a short amount of time, they provide you with full insight into the state of your organism. Unlike other methods, thanks to its soft tissue resolution, MRI is the best preventive screening method.

eKapija: It is well known that, in Serbia, patients need to wait for a long time for an MRI. How can the waiting lists be reduced, enabling patients to be examined earlier?

– There are waiting lists everywhere in Europe in state hospitals. When it comes to our country, the Clinical Center of Serbia has the longest waiting list. The center truly has the best radiologists with clinical experience, who know how this type of diagnostics is done. Everyone now wants to be treated at the Clinical Center, which is why the waiting lists are so long.

The lists primarily feature outpatients, whereas in-bed patients don't wait for examinations. By bringing private medical offices and clinics with MRI into the system, the waiting lists would be reduced considerably and permanently.

Sandra Petrovic

Klinički centar Srbije Beograd

Ministarstvo zdravlja Republike Srbije

Clinical Center of Serbia

Center for Radiology and MRI at the Clinical Center of Serbia

Bojan Banko

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