Dartford Lions Club officially opened the new Kitten Scanner at Darent Valley Hospital last week. This machine priced in excess of £23,000 was bought for the hospital with the funds raised by the Lions Club over the past year.
With the use of a computer game style Avatar, the Kitten Scanner is designed for children to ‘play a game’ which will then allow them to follow the journey of their chosen character as it has its own MRI scan. Through the process of ‘play’ the child is then expected to feel
comfortable as they copy the character in the MRI machine.
Currently, children with a fear or anxiety of having an MRI scan are sent into London to make use of their kitten scanner. The new scanner at Dartford now makes the hospital the first to have one in the whole of South East of England, something the trust is extremely proud of.
President of Dartford Lions Club, Avtar Sandhu MBE said “This is one of the largest donations our club has ever made to any one single project. This one purchase will affect the lives of so, so many members of our community throughout the South East of England. This
is only possible with the continued support being offered to us by the local community of Dartford, its the support of our residents which makes projects like this one possible – Thank you to everyone who supports our club”. President Sandhu along with other committee
members of the Lions Club met with the hospitals teams from Radiology, Charity and Chief Executives departments at the hospital as the official handover was done.
Professor Seshadri Sriprasad, deputy chief medical officer, said: “Young children are apprehensive in getting a scan done.
“The Kitten Scanner goes a long way in allaying their fears and is a welcome development. We are thankful to the Dartford Lions Club for making this happen.”
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