The company that pioneered proton beam therapy is bringing its technology to Ohio.
Loma Linda, Calif.-based
Optivus Proton Therapy, Inc., along with partner American Cancer Treatment System, soon will begin building a $170-million research and treatment campus in near Dayton that could initially put 2,000 Ohioans to work.
Late last year, the State of Ohio announced a seven-year, $600,000 tax credit for the project. It will be the first Ohio facility for Optivus and one of only eight such treatment centers in the nation, says Jenny Camper, Optivus' Columbus-based spokeswoman.
Camper says the company plans first to build a research/development and production center on the 23-acre campus near the new Austin Interchange in Miami Township. That facility will be followed by a treatment center at which patients will receive radiation therapy using the proton beam technology, she says. Construction, which has not yet begun, will be completed over the next two to three years, she says.
Proton beam therapy was pioneered by Dr. James Slater, whose son Jon heads the company. Because it can pinpoint cancer cells more accurately than some other forms of radiation therapy, it is sometimes used to fight tumors in sensitive areas like the spinal cord, eyes and the brain. While the company says the campus will primarily serve those in the Cincinnati-Dayton corridor, it will draw patients from outlying regions as well.
Optivus estimates that 2,000 temporary jobs will be created between now and 2013, with 800 jobs from 2014 forward.
The day after Optivus and its partners announced the project last May,
Kettering Medical Center announced a collaboration with American Shared Hospital Services to build an $80-million proton beam center near Dayton. While some have questioned the need for two such centers where none existed before, Camper says Optivus believes the two centers will, in the long run, complement one another.
Source: Jenny Camper, Optivus Proton Therapy
Writer: Gene Monteith