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Cancer treatment funding
£250 million funding granted for new revolutionary therapy centre at University College Hospital
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London gets funding for first 'Proton Therapy centre'
A new type of Cancer treatment that is less harmful to children is going to be available in a London hospital.
Fifteen hundred Cancer patients will benefit from the 'Proton Therapy centre' at University College Hospital.
London Tonight's Liz Wickham reports:
- Liz Wickham
New cancer therapy centre
The Department of Health has announced £250 million funding for a revolutionary Proton Therapy centre at University College Hospital in London and another in Manchester.
The therapy is more refined and targeted than radiotherapy and does much less collateral damage to the surrounding tissues.
It is of particular benefit to babies and children with brain tumours, because they often suffer brain damage, sight or hearing loss after conventional treatment.
Currently the NHS funds the treatment of some British children in the USA.
Protons are created in a colossal three story high machine called a Cyclotron, a new building in Huntely St, WI will be designed to house the therapy and it should be up and running by 2017.
1,500 patients a year will benefit from this new treatment.