The grieving widow of a Long Island man tragically pulled into an MRI machine is accusing the radiology center of negligence. She claims they failed to instruct her husband to remove a hefty 20-pound chain from his neck before entering the machine.
Adrienne Jones-McAllister, aged 61, has initiated legal action against Nassau Open MRI. The suit was filed on Tuesday in the state Supreme Court of Nassau County, following the freak accident that took her husband, Keith McAllister’s life, as reported by Newsday.
The lawsuit further contends that Jones-McAllister has endured “severe and serious personal, psychological, and emotional injuries” due to her husband’s untimely death. These injuries have left her with enduring pain, disability, disfigurement, and loss of bodily function.
According to Newsday, the legal documents state that the widow “witnessed and was fully conscious through all her senses of the injuries, suffering, and eventual death of her husband.”
Keith McAllister met his tragic fate while adorned with a large, 20-pound metal chain, which led to his being pulled into the MRI’s magnetic field at Nassau Open MRI in Westbury on July 16.
Jones-McAllister, who was present at the facility for a knee imaging, alleges that she, alongside a technician, struggled for nearly an hour to extricate McAllister from the MRI machine.
When McAllister was finally freed, he was rushed to the hospital in critical condition — having suffered multiple heart attacks as a result of the incident.
He later died from his injuries.
Jones-McAllister also previously blamed the technician for not telling her husband to remove his chain.
“That was not the first time that guy has seen that chain” on her husband, she told News 12 Long Island through tears in July. “They had a conversation about it before.”
The lawsuit, filed by her lawyers Andrew Finkelstein of Jacoby & Meyers and the Crump Law Office, also named East Coast Radiology, PC, which contracted with the Westbury facility to use its MRI machine, Sun Enterprises, an LLC that leased the facility, and GM Partners Westbury LLC, which owned the property, according to Newsday.
The amount she is seeking in damages has not been disclosed.
MRI machines produce an extremely powerful magnetic field that can attract metal objects with tremendous force.
Metal items left on or near a patient can be violently pulled toward the machine at high speed, causing serious injury or death. The machines can also heat metal objects rapidly, potentially causing serious burns to the patient.
Given the dangers, patients are required to remove all metal objects before entering an MRI suite, and screening patients for metal before entering the scanning room is considered a basic and non-negotiable safety standard in medical facilities.
