The inventor of the recently much-maligned MRI machine said Thursday his creation has taken enough abuse in the national debate over how to reduce health-care costs.

"Naturally it annoys me," said Raymond Damadian, who built the first magnetic resonance imaging machine prototype in 1977. "We're saving lives the world over."

MRIs use magnetic field and radio waves to help create high-resolution images of body organs and tissues, which can help doctors discover tumors, spinal cord injuries, multiple sclerosis and aneurysms, according to the Mayo Clinic.

But using the machines is not cheap and in the war to whittle down the price of health care, politicians have targeted diagnostic imaging machines as one place to cut costs. The Senate Finance Committee bill reduces funding for doctors using imaging tests, though the cuts are less severe than first proposed by President Obama.

Wall Street Journal by Kristina Peterson, 10/8/09

Tags: CT Scans, health care costs, MRI, Radiology