Mayo Clinic in Florida will open the Duan Family oncology building July 7, the health care system announced June 11.
The facility is at the Mayo campus at 4500 San Pablo Road at northwest Butler Boulevard and San Pablo Road.
It will house the only carbon ion therapy program in the Western Hemisphere, according to a news release.
It is expected to begin operation 2028 after the Food and Drug Administration approves the cancer-fighting technology in the U.S.
The cancer treatment center will provide photon diagnostics and conventional photon X-ray therapy upon opening.
Proton therapy equipment will be ready to use in 2027.
Besides photon therapy, other cancer treatment options offered beginning this summer include immunotherapy and chimeric antigen receptor-T cell therapy (CAR-T cell therapy) along with sophisticated imaging technology.
“The emerging treatments that will be offered in the Duan Family Building, including carbon ion therapy, are an important part of the integrated cancer practice at Mayo Clinic, ensuring constant, research-driven innovation in the care we are providing to patients,” Dr. Kent Thielen, CEO of Mayo Clinic in Florida, said in the release.
The 228,000-square-foot Duan Family Building cost $320 million to build and equip.
There are six treatment rooms. The first three provide photon therapy. The fourth and fifth rooms will house the proton therapy machines. The sixth is where the carbon ion therapy will take place. This device can also deliver proton therapy.
The facility is unlike others because the equipment is not underground. Instead, it is on the second floor. Radiation is contained behind cement walls. The walls around the carbon ion machinery took about 4,000 cement truckloads to build.
The carbon ion machine resembles a much larger and less claustrophobic CT scanner. Carbon atoms are propelled through a maze of vacuum tubes and past magnets, some about the size of a small car, at the speed of light. The larger magnets weigh 40,000 pounds.
The carbon ion machine is still under construction and photography of the proprietary equipment was not allowed during a June 10 media tour. Thielen, radiation oncology researcher Chris Beltran and radiation oncologist Dr. Laura Vallow led the tour.
The carbon ion treatments can be completed in a week rather than over a month. It is much more precise than traditional cancer treatments, treating only cancerous tumors without damaging healthy cells surrounding the tumor, Vallow said.
There are 15 carbon ion machines in the world. It has proven effective against cancers resistant to traditional radiation therapy, the release said.
“That will make it very nice for patients who are coming from other parts of the country or other parts of the world to get their treatment in a short period of time that will cause less disruption for their lives,” Vallow said.
In most case, the treatments will be done as a outpatient service.
The Duan Family Building is near the Mangurian Building, which houses hematology and oncology care and the Oncology Infusion Center.