The $33 million facility, Southeast HEALTH's most expensive project to date, took two years to build.
Executive director Judy Aslin says that it isn't necessarily that cancer patients need a separate facility, but that Southeast HEALTH needed to expand.
"Its become outpatient driven, and we could have done this on the hospital campus. We looked at facilties there and didn't have the space to do it. Many of the cancer patients either are debilitated or have become debilitated sometime with their disease and so the access is much easier at our free standing facility," Aslin says.
Each year the center can tend to 800 oncology patients. In addition, the center will be capable of handling non-cancer patients, like people who need blood transfusions, hydration, and treatment for arthitis. The center will have medical oncologists who are also hematologists to treat amenia and blood disorders.
The center tends to cancer patients who need radiation oncology and medical oncology, among others.
The center will typically be used for outpatient care.
Rachel Weatherford, KRCU
