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myCentralJersey.com
Cancer center to be built in Franklin NJ will offer high-tech treatment
By Rick Malwitz, Staff Writer
February 23, 2010
SOMERSET — Construction will begin in April on a
cancer-treatment center that will cover an area the
size of a football field and feature a 222-ton
accelerator used to send radiation to tumors with
millimeter precision.
The center is a joint venture of ProCure Treatment Centers, Princeton Radiation Oncology and the
CentraState Health System of Freehold.
The facility will cost about $160 million. If construction proceeds on schedule, it will receive patients in March 2012.
Hadley Ford, CEO of ProCure, said Somerset was chosen because of its location: "We wanted to be close to the (CentraState) market, and close to New York. Central New Jersey is an ideal location."
The facility will be located at 101-103 Cedar Grove Lane. It will be one of six in operation or under construction by ProCure of Bloomington, Ind.
"We're quite excited about this facility coming to town, adding to our growing medically-related economic base," said Township Manager Ken Daly.
"We fast-tracked the permits," said Mayor Brian
Levine. "We didn't want them to dangle in red tape."
Currently, the closest proton-therapy centers are at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia and at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. ProCure will have the first facility in the New York metropolitan area.
According to the National Cancer Institute, proton therapy is a form of radiation therapy that "can be used to target high doses of proton beam therapy to a tumor while doing less damage to normal tissues in front of and behind the tumor."
Ford explained that protons are sent from a cyclotron at 60 percent the speed of light. The
protons go into a vacuum tube and are steered by magnets to a specific location in the patient's body.
"An x-ray hits everything in its path, and goes
through the body doing collateral damage. With
proton therapy all the energy goes to a specific
point in space, and stops at the tumor," said Ford.
"You get more radiation into the tumor and less into tissue," said Ford.
Proton treatment is more expensive than traditional
radiation treatment. Medicare pays about $50,000 for proton treatment therapy, more than twice what it pays for radiation therapy.
There will be four treatment rooms with walls about
11 feet thick.
"A number of our radiation oncologists have treated
cancer with proton therapy and seen first-hand how
effective it can be," said Dr. Brian Chon, a partner
with Princeton Radiation Oncology.
The radiation oncology practice, which has offices
in Princeton, Jamesburg, Flemington and Freehold,
will provide clinical care at the center.
ProCure opened its first center in Oklahoma City.
The second is under construction in the Chicago
suburb of Warrenville, Ill. Others are under
development by ProCure in Seattle, Detroit and South Florida.
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