Raymond Damadian , the inventor of the first magnetic resonance scanning machine celebrates his 85 ^th birthday on March 16. Damadian, a physician, performed the first full-body scan of a human being in 1977.

The Nobel committee’s decision to omit Damadian from the 2003 medicine prize for the invention of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was viewed as controversial. “For some, his [Damadian’s] absence from this year's accolades is conspicuous,” wrote the medical journal, The Lancet , at the time.

The Nobel Prize was awarded to the American chemist, Paul Lauterbur , and the British physicist, Peter Mansfield , for developing a method to represent the information gathered by a scanner as an image. This is fundamental for the way the technology is used today.

Damadian has won several other accolades for his pioneering work, including the Lemelson-MIT Prize , a Bower Award and a National Medal of Technology and Innovation , among others. He was inducted into the US National Inventors Hall of Fame in 1989.

Nowadays, millions of patients around the world continue to benefit from the invention. Modern MRIs use powerful magnets, radio waves and computers to create detailed pictures that enable doctors to detect a variety of medical conditions and to monitor recovery.

IEC standards and conformity assessment help to ensure that they are reliable and safe for both patients and operators. IEC TC 62 develops some of the best known and most widely used international standards for electrical equipment in medical practice.

IEC 60601, for example, covers protection from electric shocks, radiation, fires and mechanical hazards. IEC 62464 provides guidelines on measuring the quality of MRI images.

IECEE (IEC System of Conformity Assessment Schemes for Electrotechnical Equipment) schemes test the safety, quality, efficiency and overall performance of electrical and electronic components, devices and equipment to ensure they comply with international standards.

Unfortunately, spiralling healthcare costs mean that many hospitals cannot afford to buy new MRIs and other scanning equipment. For this reason, IEC has developed IEC 63077 , Good Refurbishment Practices for Medical Imaging Equipment , that defines a systematic process for refurbishing used medical imaging equipment.