Michigan-based Beaumont Hospitals gets OK for proton cancer therapy site

Beaumont Hospitals has received final approval from the Michigan Department of Community Health to develop the state's first proton cancer therapy center. The $159-million facility will be built on the health system's Royal Oak campus, with operations beginning in 2010. The two-story, 40,000-square-foot facility requires a building nearly as large as a football field to house a nuclear cyclotron that makes the proton particles used in the treatment. It will be a partnership with Bloomington, IN-based ProCure Treatment Centers Inc., and other hospitals and investors may share equity partnerships in the arrangement.