HOSPITAL bosses in York are hoping to install a new device which will help them meet rising demand for crucial health scans.

York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust has lodged an application to extend the MRI unit at its Wigginton Road base so it can house a second scanner.

If the plans are approved by City of York Council, the organisation hopes the extra room will allow it to provide better facilities for patients and bring to an end the need for it to use a mobile scanner.

A report which has been submitted to the authority’s planners said the existing MRI unit, which was set up about 15 years ago, had “become stretched beyond its initial capacity”, leading to the trust applying to enlarge it and install a permanent second scanner MRI scanners see patients lie within large, cylinder-shaped magnets, with radio waves then being sent through their body and used to make pictures of its tissue. They are regarded as the prime technique for finding tumours and bleeding in the brain, as well as heart defects, and detect whether somebody has multiple sclerosis.

Patrick Crowley, chief executive of the hospital trust, said: “These plans are at an early stage. We have submitted a planning application to enable us to extend the current MRI facility, which we hope will be able to accommodate a second MRI scanner.

“Currently, we use a mobile second scanner, so an additional fixed machine would enable us to meet the increase in demand and would improve the experience for patients.”

The trust applied to extend the unit in 2009 and gained approval from planners, but then found the scheme would need more space than expected, leading to a new application being drawn up. A decision is expected to be made next month.

Space Architecture, which has designed the proposed extension, said it would be based along the same lines as the hospital’s current MRI unit, with their planning statement saying: “The proposed layouts have been designed to provide staff and patients with improved facilities.”