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USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center, part of Keck Medicine of USC, has opened a state-of-the-art radiation oncology and imaging center in Newport Beach.
The new location will add radiation therapy services to its existing medical oncology locations in Newport Beach and Irvine for “more seamless care,” according to Keck Medicine Chief Executive Rodd Hanners.
“Opening this new location really broadened the spectrum of our cancer services, allowing us to seamlessly care for our patients in Orange County,” Hanners told the Business Journal.
The 12,500-square-foot clinic is said to house some of the latest imaging and radiation therapy technologies.
In addition to its outposts in Newport Beach and Irvine, USC Norris has an 11,000-square-foot oncology treatment center in Buena Park that also offers radiation therapy.
USC Norris opened the Newport Beach facility in collaboration with private investment group Advanced Radiotherapy Technologies (ART Health), which provided the upfront capital.
Magnet for Cancer Care
USC Norris joins other large health organizations such as UCI Health, Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian and City of Hope that are investing significantly in cancer care in Orange County.
UCI Health, the largest hospital organization in OC, is spending $1.3 billion on a medical complex on the north end of its campus in Irvine.
It opened the Chao Family Comprehensive Cancer Center and Ambulatory Care building last year with the third and final phase of the complex, a 144-bed acute care hospital, scheduled to open in the fourth quarter of this year.
Also underway in Irvine are Hoag’s $1.2 billion expansion and City of Hope’s upcoming 73-bed hospital that will be exclusively focused on treating and curing cancer.
“We’re not coming in to compete with community physicians,” Hanners said. “We’re coming in to work side by side with them and fill gaps of care that they have.”
Cutting-Edge Technology
Keck Medicine said its Newport Beach center is equipped with some of the latest technologies.
A key feature of the clinic is the RefleXion X1 System, a relatively new-to-market machine using biology-guided radiation therapy.
The Newport Beach center is the first in Orange County, and the third in California, to offer the treatment, according to Keck Medicine.
It combines two imaging technologies to light up the tumor and guides the beam to the targets in real-time, minimizing radiation to surrounding healthy tissue.
“It offers new treatment options for patients that have metastatic cancer who might not otherwise be a candidate for radiation therapy,” Hanners said.
Last month, the clinic treated its first patient on the machine, which received Food and Drug Administration approval in 2023 for lung and bone tumors.
Hidee Warner, the patient and a retired nurse living in Irvine, had a lung tumor that spread from breast cancer that was successfully removed by the treatment.
The RefleXion will also be installed in USC Norris’s upcoming facility in Pasadena, set to open later this year.