Depending on the type of scan your doctor ordered, the MRI technologist may wrap a special belt (actually an antenna) around the region of your body that is to be scanned. If you are having a head scan, your head will rest in a special fixture. Once you are comfortably positioned, the technologist will start the scan. At that point, all you have to do is be as still as you can until the MRI exam is over-the more still, the better. The reason you have to lie still is that movement blurs the MRI images. Depending on what your doctor ordered and the area being scanned, the procedure will take between 15 and 45 minutes. The MRI technologist will be able to tell you how long it should take. You won’t feel anything, but you will hear some low-volume, intermittent, rumbling noises throughout the scan. These sounds are normal. Our scanners are very quiet in comparison to “tunnel” MRI scanners whose sounds are sometimes described as firing machine guns or rattling garbage cans. If you like, someone can be with you in the scanner room, provided it’s safe for the person to be there (A visitor is subject to the scanner’s magnetic field too So please make sure it is safe for the visitor to be in the scanner room). It is common for a parent to stay with a child In fact we encourage it. Smaller children being scanned can sit comfortably on a parent’s lap during the process.