An English expert on multi-million dollar medical imaging machines yesterday said it would be "hard to justify'' the expense of buying one for Bermuda.

Prof. Graham Cherryman of Leicester Royal Infirmary -- recommended as the top man in the field by the British Medical Association -- said his unit dealt with 5,500 people a year.

He added: "Anything under 4,000 a year starts to become quite expensive.'' Prof. Cherryman was speaking as doctors here question the financial wisdom of Bermuda buying its own multi-million-dollar Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scanner.

The proposal has caused a split in the Island's medical profession, with the Bermuda Medical Society coming out against the proposal, and a minority of doctors backing the buy.

MRIs provide a better picture than X-rays, especially of soft tissue like the brain and organs, and are valuable in examining bones and joints as well.

One doctor admitted the machines were a "wonderful'' piece of equipment -- but added that "our health care dollars could be better spent elsewhere''.

According to Argus -- the Island's biggest provider of health insurance -- around 150 to 250 people a year are sent overseas for MRIs under insurance cover.

Prof. Cherryman said the cost per patient in his unit worked out at the equivalent of around $350 a scan.

He added: "A substantial part of the cost is in equipment and maintenance contracts -- 70 percent of the costs are fixed.'' That means a Bermuda MRI -- where the cost of living is far higher than the UK -- would be even more expensive per patient.

Prof. Cherryman said: "If you include the cost of building, security and all these requirements, it's hard to justify it for 60,000 people, unless there are peculiarities relating to referring people off the Island.

"For 150 people a year, it's obviously not terribly economic.'' But Prof. Cherryman added hospital chiefs would have to balance that against the cost of referrals overseas and a lower rate of referrals for people found not be suffering from "significant disease'' after an MRI scan.

Inquiries carried out by The Royal Gazette overseas found the UK has one scanner per two million people while Canada has one per 2.5 million people.

It was revealed last year that a study into buying an MRI -- which bests X-rays images by using magnetic impulses rather than radiation -- was underway.

Argus president Gerald Simons admitted on Wednesday that he was unsure where pressure to buy an MRI was coming from.

He added: "The problem we face if we had such a machine and that led to increased use of the scans, that would lead to increased claims -- and that would mean increased premiums.

"The question we would have to ask the community as a whole is where the next dollar of medical care costs should be spent -- an MRI, preventative measures or on some other facility.''