IU and IU Health have decided to close the IU Health Proton Therapy Center and the IU Cyclotron by the end of this year due to financial struggles, said Mark Land, associate vice president of IU Communications.
In the 10 years since the facility opened, 2,000 patients have been treated, Land said.
IU's proton therapy center is a collaboration between IU Health and IU Research and Technology Corp. Upon its opening in 2004, it became the nation's third proton therapy facility and has been treating cancer patients since.
Thirty patients are currently receiving treatment in the facility, but the center will not close until each of the patients’ treatment has been completed, Land said.
No more patients will be admitted to the facility, and this closing should occur no later than January 1, 2015.
Before the Proton Therapy Center opened in 2004, the IU Cyclotron had been used in physics experiments since 1976, Land said.
“The university has been losing money on it ... pretty much since the beginning,” Land said.
At the time, the center was one of about three in the country and the only facility in the Midwest to offer proton therapy, a type of treatment best served to deal with specific cancers because of its ability to be focused and not damage healthy tissues during treatments, he said.
“Most of the patients we see are brain cancer, eye cancer,” he said.
Land said that as time has gone on, proton therapy has experienced vast improvements.
“Over time, it’s gotten more competitive,” Land said.
Land said that in recent years, more and more proton therapy centers have opened with technology made specifically for proton therapy, unlike IU's customized Cyclotron.
“Their technology is newer and less expensive to run than ours,” he said.
He said the Proton Therapy Center lost $3.5 million in the last year.
Along with the competition, the fact that proton therapy is not as widely used as was once anticipated has also posed problems for the facility.
“There aren’t as many potential patients,” Land said.
Because of the limited pool of patients, he said there is not enough potential revenue to be made were IU and IU Health to decide to renovate it. After speaking to an outside review committee, it was decided that closing the Proton Therapy Center would be the best plan.
“Once you do that, there is very little to do with the Cyclotron,” Land said, explaining why the IU Cyclotron will be closed simultaneously.
He said the closing of the facility has nothing to do with the staff or patient care.
“They’ve done a great job,” he said.
Land said there are about 120 employees working either with the Cyclotron or the patients receiving proton therapy at present.
“We’re going to offer everybody six weeks of paid time to do nothing but find a job,” Land said.
At present, he said, the focus of the employees should be the patients.
Anybody who has not found a job by that time will be able to receive a week’s pay for every year they have worked at the facility, potentially adding up to a maximum of 32 weeks of pay including the original six weeks.
Land said they are doing whatever they can to help employees with the transition.
“It’s going to be a blow for some people,” he said.
