Hartford HealthCare, Yale New Haven Health to hold groundbreaking for new proton therapy center

RENDERING | CONTRIBUTED A rendering of the Connecticut Proton Therapy Center planned for 932 Northrop Road in Wallingford.

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By David Krechevsky

More than two years after receiving final approval, Hartford HealthCare (HHC) and Yale New Haven Health System (YNHHS) will break ground on their new $75 million proton therapy center in Wallingford.

The state’s two largest health systems will hold a groundbreaking ceremony on Thursday at 2 p.m. at 932 Northrop Road in Wallingford, the site planned for the jointly operated facility.

The 25,000-square-foot Connecticut Proton Therapy Center would be the state’s first to use highly targeted radiological proton therapy, rather than X-rays, to treat cancer.

There are just over 40 proton therapy centers in the U.S., but none in Connecticut. The closest centers are in New York and Massachusetts.

The two health systems had announced in April 2022 that they had secured final approval to open the center and initially indicated it would open in 2025. The project, however, was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic. Under the latest timeline, officials expect the facility to be ready for patients around March 2026.

HHC and YNHHS are principals of Connecticut Proton Therapy Center LLC, which originally formed in 2019. The LLC purchased the vacant 12 acres on Northrop Road in July 2021 for $1.8 million.

Proton therapy uses a high energy beam of protons to irradiate cancer. With proton beams, there is less entry, exit, and scattered radiation. That allows physicians to deliver higher doses of radiation to tumors, with less impact on healthy tissue and fewer side effects compared to other radiation therapies, the health systems said.

Proton therapy can be used against solid cancer tumors, such as tumors of the brain, central nervous system, eye, gastrointestinal tract, head and neck, liver, lung, prostate, spine and breast.

A second proton therapy center has been proposed but remains in the regulatory approval process. In November 2023, Danbury Proton LLC filed a certificate of need application with the state Office of Health Strategy to establish a proton therapy center for cancer treatment.

If approved, the estimated $90 million center would be at 85 Wooster Heights Road, in Danbury.