Plans for two separate projects to build controversial proton therapy centers in the Dayton, Ohio, area are still alive — though neither project has made much discernible public progress over the last year or so.
Despite both being announced in the first half of 2010, neither of the projects have broken ground or completed financing, and at least one appears to be well behind schedule. (It’s likely the other one is, too, but its backers didn’t set out a specific timeline so it’s difficult to say for sure.)
The difficulty each of the projects is having in getting off the ground suggests that at least one — if not both — are unlikely to come to fruition.
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Even the executive director of the National Association for Proton Therapy has said it’s unlikely there will be enough financing for two proton centers in Dayton — or any one area, for that matter.
One of the projects, a planned $75 million proton therapy center by Dayton-area health system Kettering Health Network, recently applied for $7 million in federal funding for its proton center, the Dayton Daily News reported. In its application, Kettering said $35 million would come from its partner, San Francisco-based American Shared Hospital Services, while another $10 million would come from unidentified philanthropic sources. That could leave Kettering footing about $20 million of the bill.
Further complicating matters for Kettering are potential looming financial troubles. An executive recently acknowledged that revenues aren’t at projected levels, and Moody’s Investment Service last year said the health network’s bond rating could be lowered if it didn’t meet cash-flow projections.
A Kettering spokeswoman declined comment on any details surrounding the proton center project.
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The other project is a $170 million proton center that’s being led by San Bernadino, California-based Optivus Proton Therapy. Optivus CEO Jon Slater said in May 2010 that he hoped to have full financing for the project in place in a “handful of months.” Later that year, Slater said he hoped to break ground by the end of 2010 and have the proton center operational in 2013. Those goals now look overly optimistic.
Slater wasn’t available for comment for this article, but told the Dayton Daily News that he’d update local officials on the project by the end of March.
From the beginning, there have been questions about whether the Dayton area could support two proton centers, but backers of the projects brushed aside those concerns.
Proton therapy has come under increasing scrutiny as critics question whether it’s worth the expense. Former White House adviser and oncologist Ezekial Emanuel co-authored a New York Times editorial earlier this week that decried the rush to build proton centers as a quintessential example of what’s wrong with American healthcare.
The problem with proton therapy, Emanuel and other critics argue, is that it’s sometimes twice as expensive as alternative therapies, yet in many cases hasn’t been proven to work any better.
Like more conventional cancer treatment methods, proton therapy uses radiation. The difference is that protons do the bulk of their work beneath the skin where a tumor is located, unlike X-rays, which tend to lose power and cause collateral damage as they penetrate the body’s tissues. In theory, that means proton therapy allows for the more precise targeting of tumors, and a reduction in collateral damage.
Photo from flickr user habi