In Sunday’s Business section (July 21), you mislead your readership with statements in the picture caption, “An MRI scanner used by Prenuvo produces detailed images ...”

Unlike many other types of scans, MRIs don’t use radiation and the article “Celebrities are getting $2,000 MRI scans: Should you?” by Matthew Perrone, AP Health Writer, who states that magnetic resonance imaging does not use radiation. MRI, and its related technique of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), do indeed utilize a form of electromagnetic radiation, specifically in the megahertz to gigahertz frequency range, the frequency range containing radio frequencies. In fact, MRI does not work without the combination of a magnetic field and this form of radiation.

What you mean to say is that MRI does not use any form of ionizing radiation. For example, x-rays (as in diagnostic x-ray imaging and CAT scanning) or radiation emitted by radioactive isotopes. Such forms of ionizing radiation are the forms hazardous to one's health in excessive doses. Reproducing a story written by an AP staff writer does not abrogate your own responsibility to fact check the scientific accuracy or your stories.

The AP staff writer is wrong, and you are culpable for not catching the error and promulgating an inaccuracy. There are plenty of residents in your newspaper coverage area that could have corrected such an error, if you would only have checked. Be scientifically accurate!

Thomas Sharp

Preston