MRI Safety Checker, Body Jewelry

Can you have an MRI scan with body jewelry in?

That decision belongs to the radiographer and the MRI unit, never to a website, and it is made at the scan site with your particular jewellery in front of them. What you can do is arrive able to tell them what it is made of, and this page exists for that.

The material matters because of three separate hazards. Ferromagnetic materials can be pulled hard in a high-field magnet. Conductive metal, especially anything forming a loop, can heat under the radiofrequency field and burn. And metal distorts the image, which can hide the very thing being looked for.

Non-metallic, non-conductive, non-magnetic polymers such as BioFlex® and PTFE raise none of those three, which is why plastic retainers are the usual suggestion when something has to stay in. Implant-grade titanium is weakly magnetic and widely accepted, but acceptance still comes from the unit, not from a material name. Anything ferromagnetic, anything with a magnetic clasp, and anything sold as "surgical steel" without a grade, expect to take out.

Say what it is, say who made it, and let them decide.

What is the safest body jewelry for MRI scans?

Non-metallic retainers are what units generally ask for, because a solid polymer is not magnetic, does not conduct, does not heat under the radiofrequency field and does not distort the image. BioFlex®, PTFE and nylon are all in that group.

BioFlex® is our own material, so take this as disclosure rather than a recommendation: it is a polypropylene random copolymer (PP-R) made by Poli International, ISO 10993 tested and built on a USP Class VI rated resin, which is why it is used for jewellery that stays in the body rather than only for a scan.

What none of that does is clear you for a scan. No material name does. A retainer still has to be seen and accepted by the unit, and if they want it out, it comes out.

Why does the ASTM F2503 standard matter for body jewelry?

ASTM F2503 is the Standard Practice for Marking Medical Devices and Other Items for Safety in the Magnetic Resonance Environment. It defines three classifications: MR Safe (no known hazards in any MR environment), MR Conditional (no known hazards under specified conditions of field strength, SAR, and scan duration), and MR Unsafe (known hazards, do not use in MR environment).

These classifications were developed for implanted medical devices, but the same physics applies to body jewelry.

Radiographers rely on ASTM F2503 terminology when making admit/remove decisions at the scanner door. Jewelry manufacturers that understand and can reference this standard provide the clinical evidence chain needed in a healthcare setting.

If my body jewelry is titanium, can I keep it in during an MRI, or should I remove everything regardless?

Titanium is non-ferromagnetic, so it will not be pulled or twisted by the magnet, and in that narrow sense it is generally safe. Even so, my default advice is to remove it if you can, for three reasons: it can create an image artifact that obscures the very area being scanned, any conductive loop can heat up under the radiofrequency field, and many radiology departments simply run a remove-everything policy you will not argue your way around.

If the piercing is fresh and cannot come out, do not stay silent, tell the radiographer the exact grade and gauge, because field strength matters: a 3T scanner behaves very differently from a 1.5T. A BioFlex® retainer sidesteps the whole question, which is why a radiographer can clear it without a second thought.