At this time, the Intermountain Neuroimaging Consortium (INC) at ICS have determined that the most prudent course of action is to suspend our scanning operations. We feel the close proximity to participants’ faces needed when positioning participants for MRI scans, and the fact that participants to our facility come from all over the region, differentiates us from other units on campus whose physical spaces remain open at this time. In addition, many of you decided on your own that you will suspend all in-person testing for the time being.
If you have any concerns about this decision, please contact Marie or Nicole, who will be happy to set a time for a Zoom meeting.
A few practical points:
• We do not yet have a date for returning to scans.
• You do not need to cancel your scans on the MRI calendar. We will take care of this.
• Nicole will reach out to active and upcoming studies early next week to meet to discuss the “coming back online” process.
• Please contact Teryn to arrange a time to retrieve anything in the control room that you cannot be without (e.g., computers, behavioral data).
• We will all still be working (from home), so you can reach us via e-mail or Slack or phone as usual [Note that like many of you, Nicole and Teryn have school-aged children at home, and their responses may not be quite as fast as usual]
We want to reassure you that we will find a way to maximize the data we are able to “save” from your longitudinal and time-sensitive studies. We will use the next few weeks to create a “coming back online” plan that enables us to catch up on missed time and ensure this closure has the least possible impact on your studies. We’ve faced this issue before with the scanner upgrades, and while we didn’t have much time to prepare for this shut down, we are confident with your partnership we will find an effective path forward.
Thank you for your cooperation during this challenging time. Please take care of yourselves, and as always please reach out if we can be of assistance.
With gratitude,
All of us at the INC