Southwest Florida Proton has a partner.
The group building the state-of-the-art cancer center in south Lee County announced this week that Lee Healthcare Holdings, a subsidiary of Lee Health, will be an investor.
Lee Health, besides putting up some of the $80 million-plus cost, will run the diagnostic imaging center in the facility.
Dr. Arie Dosoretz, one of the founders of Advocate Radiation Oncology, announced the partnership this week at an event to celebrate the final pouring of the foundation for the 35,000-square-foot building at the northwest corner of Three Oaks and Estero parkways in Estero.
Florida is home to six of the nation’s 42 proton therapy centers. Two are in Miami and two are in Jacksonville, while Orlando and Delray Beach are each home to one proton therapy center. None are on the west coast.
Proton therapy can be used near sensitive and hard-to-reach areas such as the spine, brain, throat and left-sided breast cancers.
Proton therapy is more precise than regular radiation treatments. It targets only the tumor, limiting damage to good tissue and causing fewer side effects.
Last year Dosoretz called proton therapy “a missing cancer tool in Southwest Florida.”
He said his group was looking locally and “not so locally” for partners.
He wasn’t sure who started the conversation with Lee Health.
“We had many, many conversations,” he said. “I mean it was an ongoing dialogue.”
The partnership made sense, he said, because Lee Health dominates the local health market and has lots of expertise.
Many vendors approached Lee Health over the past five or six years, said Lee Health’s COO Dr. Scott Nygaard. The synergy with Advocate made sense, he said.
“We are excited to be a part of bringing this state-of-the-art technology and forward-thinking cancer care to Southwest Florida,” said Larry Antonucci, M.D., MBA, president and CEO for Lee Health. “Lee Health is pleased to be able to work with such like-minded partners who are focused on establishing Southwest Florida as a destination for cutting edge, first-rate cancer care.”
Lee Health might not be the last partnership for Southwest Florida Proton.
“We’ll continue to look for good strategic partners,” Dosoretz said. “There’s not much downside in talking with potential groups or people that you think could enhance the care in a given place.”
Partnerships can go beyond investors, he said. There are research partnerships, even hospitality partnerships because people will be coming from beyond the local area for treatment and needing to stay in hotels.
Southwest Florida Proton still has a long way to go before opening the 35,000-square-foot building on the northwest corner of Three Oaks and Estero parkways.
Belgium-based IBA is building the proton therapy machine known as Proteus 1. It should arrive by early next summer, but it will take from nine months to a year to set it up and calibrate.
Lee Health’s diagnostic imaging suite and regular radiation treatments will be available sometime in mid- to late 2025, with the proton therapy machine ready not too long after that.
It will take a staff of about 50 people to run it, including doctors, nurses, front desk personnel and technicians.
The accelerator, which speeds up the energy of the protons, weighs 110,000 pounds. The beams travel at two-thirds the speed of light. The gentry and counterweight, which rotates around the patient, weigh 150,000 and 40,000 pounds respectively.
The system costs between $20 million and $28 million, and it takes a three-story building to house them.
It is especially helpful for infants and young children with cancer. It lowers the risk of children having a future cancer caused by normal radiation.
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