Alma College now houses a DEXA scanner available for community use

Alma College has recently acquired a DEXA scanner that will be housed in the McIntyre Center for Health Science. The scanner is available for use by community members at a much lower price than it would cost to use similar scanners at local hospitals or clinics.

According to an article on Alma College’s website, Alex Montoye, who serves as the department chair of the Integrative Physiology and Health Sciences department and as an associate professor, was quoted as saying of the acquisition, “It’s absolutely going to be a value to students to use this kind of equipment, because they’ll see it if they go into any type of a clinical setting, or they’ll look at data that has come from one of these scans and get an idea of how it works.”

DEXA scanners are useful for all sorts of health assessments. According to Montoye, women start getting these scans yearly to assess their risk of osteoporosis once they reach a certain age. Student athletes and anyone partaking in a diet plan also often get DEXA scans to take a look at their body fat percentages and their bone densities. Another application is to get a scan done prior to surgery to get data for recovery plan purposes.

The scan provides users with a Z-score, which compares their numbers to other people of similar age, gender, and ethnicity. Montoye said, “For some people, seeing the types of things they feel in their bodies illustrated by numbers is a very powerful thing. We had one student-athlete here recently with a persistent lower-leg injury. Four months after the injury, she did a DEXA scan and found that her injured leg was a full two pounds lighter than her uninjured leg, most of which was lean/muscle mass loss— that’s how much she had been favoring her injured leg. That number was shocking and informative to her, and that’s what we’re here to do.”

The DEXA scanner is available for community use by appointment, and will run between $50 and $100. The community service this opportunity provides is a boon to Alma, and to the community.

“Community health is one of those areas where Alma College can certainly make a difference, and this machine will assist in moving us toward to the goal of helping those in our community,” said Montoye.

For more information about Alma College, visit the school’s website.