After an ABC15 investigation found SimonMed had operated for years unlicensed and unregulated by state health officials, Arizona began licensing dozens of its imaging centers.
Over 2023 and 2024, ABC15 Arizona’s investigative team reported that SimonMed had operated imaging centers in Arizona for roughly six years unlicensed and unregulated by the Arizona Department of Health Services, under a ‘private-office’ licensing exemption (ABC15). The reporting followed a May 2022 incident at SimonMed’s Avondale location, where a patient and a corrections officer were pulled into an MRI machine after metal restraints were not removed — an incident that, because the facility was unlicensed, triggered no mandatory federal reporting (ABC15).
Following the investigation, the state health department began licensing SimonMed’s Arizona locations as outpatient treatment centers (ABC15). ABC15 later reported that nearly all SimonMed AZ locations — 56, with more applications pending — had become licensed, and that state health leaders promised changes to how the facilities are regulated (ABC15). Corroborating trade coverage: Radiology Business.