The story of IMRIS, a Minnetonka-based medical device firm, dates back some years ago to a Winnipeg, Manitoba neurosurgeon’s brainstorm.
Rather than relying on post-surgical images to verify tumor removal, the surgeon came up with the idea of using a ceiling-mounted magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) device to provide images before the patient was stitched up and wheeled to the recovery room. “It started with the surgeon thinking in real time, about being able to find out, ‘Did we get all of the tumor?’ before closing the patient up,” says IMRIS president and CEO Andrew Flanagan.
The idea of hanging an MRI-CT device from the ceiling of a hospital surgical suite seemed unlikely at the time, Flanagan explains. An MRI machine weighs about eight tons. It required “an engineering feat”—figuring out how to securely attach the imaging equipment, and the rail system used to move it, to operating room ceilings. “The surgeon can get a live picture while the patient is still on the operating table,” Flanagan says. It’s a better alternative to the traditional method of “closing the patient up, looking at the image afterwards and potentially needing to have a second procedure,” he says.
IMRIS, which relocated its headquarters from Winnipeg to Minnetonka in 2013, makes the world’s only moving, ceiling-mounted intraoperative magnetic resonance imaging (iMRI) or computed tomography (iCT) imaging system, allowing neurosurgeons to see critical anatomical details while the patient is on the operating table. The company says its system gives neurosurgeons greater precision and accuracy during surgery, reducing the need for additional operations and reducing the risk of infection when moving patients in and out of the OR.
The IMRIS surgical theatre is being used in more and more hospitals, Flanagan says, and the firm is ramping up production. In the past two years, the company has expanded its client base to more than 75 customers, including prestigious hospitals around the world, like Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Massachusetts General Hospital, Cleveland Clinic, Johns Hopkins Hospital and Beijing Tiantan Hospital. To date, IMRIS’ surgical theatre has been used in more than 30,000 procedures.
Along with architects to design surgical suites and technicians to install its imaging systems, the company has a “strong staff” of Ph.D. physicists and engineers to work on improving the technology, and potentially inventing new, related products, Flanagan says.
“Because we are supporting these complex procedures, we are focused on any technology that helps the neurosurgeon,” he says. For example, IMRIS has developed improved versions of the electronic “coils” that help create the images and has redesigned the tables used to support the patients, Flanagan says.
“We’re also investing in new technology. There are some procedures the system can’t be used for,” because of the electromagnetic field used by the imaging devices, says Flanagan. “But we’re inventing new technology that will allow that to happen.”
IMRIS expects the market for ceiling-mounted imaging to grow to $1.5 billion by 2022. Its competitors in the MRI space include General Electric, Phillips Electronics and Siemens Healthineers. “Those companies don’t spend a lot of time in neurology; they are mostly involved in radiology. So, we typically win three of every four opportunities where we are invited” to submit proposals, Flanagan says.
The company is continuing to grow, now with more than 95 employees, most of them at the Minnetonka facility, Flanagan says. The Minnetonka location is an asset in recruiting employees from around the country and globally. “They find this area to be very attractive, a place where they can find very affordable housing in attractive neighborhoods. It’s also an advantage not being located in a downtown area, where our employees would have a longer commute,” he says.
To learn more about IMRIS’ technology, visit the website here.
