Using a full-body MRI scan might help find cancers in body parts where doctors don’t normally screen people, like without a regular test.

When doctors use full-body MRI scans on people who feel fine, about two out of three cancers they find are in body parts that don’t usually get checked during routine screenings—so this scan might catch cancers other tests miss.

Using whole-body MRI to screen everyone for cancer isn't a good idea right now because it often misses cancers, finds too many harmless things that cause worry, isn't done the same way everywhere, and we don't know if it actually helps people live longer or healthier lives.

When doctors didn’t have a regular test to check for cancer, a special full-body MRI scan found cancer in nearly 7 out of 10 people—so it might help catch cancers that other tests miss.

There's no universal rulebook for using full-body MRI scans to check healthy people for cancer, so different hospitals do it differently—making it hard to trust the results or use them widely in doctors' offices.

Instead of choosing between whole-body MRI and regular cancer tests like mammograms, doctors should use both together — because MRI can find cancers that other tests don’t check for.