Effectiveness of disaster-prevention technologies against quake-induced damage of MR scanners during the Great East Japan Earthquake

In the present study, we have performed a statistical analysis to investigate damages in magnetic resonance (MR) scanners caused by the Great East Japan Earthquake (GEJE, magnitude 9.0) and evaluated whether these disaster-prevention technologies contributed to the reduction of damages in the GEJE or not. It was confirmed that the extent of damage was significantly different between seismic scale (SS) 5 and SS over 6. Our survey study demonstrated that anchoring of MR facilities reduced damages due to quakes and demonstrated that anchoring is an efficient method for quake-induced damage prevention. The odds ratio revealed that base isolation was very useful to prevent damages in MR scanners.