PROTON SYSTEM INSTALLATION BEGINS IN ITALY

Installation of an IBA cyclotron, beam line and three state-of-the-art patient treatment rooms has begun in Trento, Italy, at the Agenzia Provinciale Per la Protonterapie (ATreP).

IBA engineers expect the proton beam system and first patient treatment room will be ready for commissioning by ATreP staff in Spring 2013. Commissioning is a monthlong process that includes confirming proton beam and dose accuracy, and integrating three-dimensional imaging into the proton targeting system. It is the final stage before clinicians at the facility can begin killing cancerous tumors with proton beams.

An IBA cyclotron arrived at the site in February and was hoisted to its concrete vault by a pair of heavy-lift cranes. Workers from the rigging firms of the Belgium-based Sarens Group and Italy-based Midolini Group moved the 220-ton cyclotron into place.

The facility has been designed in collaboration with Impresa di Costruzioni Ing. E. Mantovani S.P.A. of Venice, Italy.

ATreP was established by the autonomous Province of Trento in 2004. The three-story facility will be managed by the Provincial Health Service.

ATreP will house two gantry treatment rooms and a fixed-beam treatment room. Each of the treatment rooms will be equipped with the latest advance in IBA’s Universal Nozzle, the multi-mode proton beam delivery mechanism, which includes Pencil Beam Scanning.