Although plans for a $100 million New Orleans proton therapy cancer center have been derailed a year after officials announced the project, the $85 million Baton Rouge proton center is on track, with construction expected to begin next year.
The New Orleans project developer, Tennessee-based Provision Healthcare, remains hopeful of launching a proton center in the region, but says original plans for a New Orleans center at the University Medical Center campus have been scrapped.
“While disappointed that the project at UMC will not move forward in its previously announced form, Provision remains committed to providing access to this state-of-the-art cancer treatment to cancer patients in the region,” David Raubach, Provision vice president of U.S. sales and business development, says in a statement. “Provision will look for future opportunities to bring this life-changing therapy to New Orleans.”
Louisiana Economic Development Secretary Don Pierson says discussions between Provision and potential partners—including UMC, LCMC Health and LSU Health New Orleans—have not “yielded a framework for building the proton therapy center and providing ancillary services.”
Pierson noted in a statement that no state incentives have been applied because they are contingent on the project moving forward with the investment of capital and the hiring of employees, as well as payroll performance over a number of years.
LED directed any additional questions to Provision.
In Baton Rouge, meanwhile, the Louisiana ProtonCare Center continues to move forward, says Steve Hicks, CEO and chairman of Provident Resources Group, which will develop and operate the center. Plans were announced in May 2017 to build the proton center in the Baton Rouge Health District.
Construction was supposed to begin this year, but now is expected to break ground next summer, says Suzy Sonnier, executive director of the Baton Rouge Health District. Construction will take about two years, so officials anticipate the opening to be as far out as the second quarter of 2021.
Officials are eyeing land near Our Lady of the Lake Children’s Hospital between Essen Lane and Bluebonnet Boulevard, Sonnier adds.
The Louisiana ProtonCare Center would be the newest addition to the Baton Rouge Health District, and several health district members agreed to be clinical partners, according to the announcement.
But one month later, Baton Rouge General pulled out of the partnership over questions about the treatment’s medical viability.
“While there is some promise in treating a limited number of childhood cancers with protons, controlled clinical trials have not demonstrated superior outcomes for the vast majority of cancers in adults when compared to Intensity Modulated Radiation Therapy,” Baton Rouge General CEO Edgardo Tenreiro said at the time.
State economic development officials offered both proton centers incentive packages that included $1 million in performance-based grants, payable in five annual installments beginning in 2021.
