The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has cleared a new tool for producing muscle assessment scores from MRI scans, officials announced Tuesday.
Previously approved in Canada, AMRA Medical’s MAsS (Muscle Assessment Score) Scan utilizes muscle and fat biomarkers from magnetic resonance images to help physicians evaluate body composition. AMRA said it offers the product as a medical device service that uses a rapid neck-to-knee MRI protocol to produce actionable, patient-specific reports.
"The beauty of the report is that it is easy to understand, it creates a common language among clinicians with the muscle assessment score, and adds only minutes to an already prescribed MRI,” Eric Converse, CEO of the Linköping, Sweden-based digital health company, said in a Dec. 7 announcement.
Marty Stempniak has covered healthcare since 2012, with his byline appearing in the American Hospital Association's member magazine, Modern Healthcare and McKnight's. Prior to that, he wrote about village government and local business for his hometown newspaper in Oak Park, Illinois. He won a Peter Lisagor and Gold EXCEL awards in 2017 for his coverage of the opioid epidemic.