By Ivan Pereira
Southeast Queens’ health civic group said it is reserving judgment on plans to bring a high-tech cancer treatment center to the former site of Mary Immaculate Hospital.
The state Department of Health is currently reviewing three proposals to set up a proton therapy cancer center in the state, according to a spokesman for the agency. One of the proposals calls for a $273 million center to be built at the site of the Jamaica medical center that closed its doors last year following the bankruptcy of its parent company, Caritas Healthcare, according to a report in Crain’s New York Business.
A $227 million facility on the west side of Manhattan and a $201 million center located upstate are also under consideration by the state, according to a DOH spokesman.
The facility would give patients a new type of treatment called proton beam technology, which uses radiation that is emitted in “precisely focused, cancer-killing doses,” Crain’s reported.
Although the plans for the Queens facility, known as The Proton Therapy Cancer Center of New York, are still in the early stages, members of the borough health advocacy group Southeast Queens in Support of Health Services have had mixed reactions to the proposal.
SQUISH member Nisha Agarwal said the group wanted to get more information on the proposal, including how it charges for its services before giving backing.
“The coalition members are debating the merits of the cancer center,” she said. “We don’t know too much about this proton beam technology.”
Eugenia Rudmann, a SQUISH member and president of the Hollis Park Gardens Association, said she personally supported the cancer center. Rudmann said cancer rates are higher in southeast Queens and too many patients have to travel outside the neighborhood to get their treatment.
“We do have people who have this illness and, of course, if the site comes to us, the local community would be able to take advantage of it,” she said.
The state DOH said there are 563.7 cases of cancer per 100,000 males in southeast Queens and 376.5 per 100,000 females in the neighborhood. Prostate cancer is the highest form of the disease among men with 229 per 100,000 cases, according to the state. Breast cancer leads female cancer cases with 107.1 per 100,000, the DOH said.
Jule Grant, another SQUISH member, said she was not too impressed with the plan because it would not fill the real needs of the community. Since the loss of Mary Immaculate, the remaining hospitals within the southeast Queens area have been swamped with extra patients and residents have been traveling far to get their health needs met, according to Grant.
“I really don’t think that’s a top need for the community,” she said of the cancer center. “The best usage of the site would be primary care.”
But City Councilman Leroy Comrie (D-St. Albans) said he was thrilled Mary Immaculate was being considered for the proton beam cancer center because the community has been hit hard by Mary Immaculate’s closing.
“It would be a necessary component,” Comrie said of the cancer center.
Reach reporter Ivan Pereira by e-mail at ipereira@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4546.
