Advanced Cancer Treatment
Nebraska Medicine Acquires 35-Ton Proton Therapy System, Enhancing Cancer Care
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A 35-ton proton therapy machine arrived at Nebraska Medicine's Fred & Pamela Buffett Cancer Center in Omaha on Saturday, lifted into place by a 200-ton crane. The $36 million system will give cancer patients across a six-state region access to a treatment that was previously only available hundreds of miles away, according to Nebraska Medicine.
The device, made by Mevion Medical Systems, is expected to treat its first patient in March 2027. Until then, teams will spend months calibrating and testing the beam. Nebraska now joins fewer than 50 centers in the entire United States that offer proton therapy, Becker's Oncology reported.
How Proton Therapy Hits Tumors Without Damaging Healthy Tissue
Traditional X-ray radiation passes through the body. That means healthy tissue behind a tumor gets hit too. Proton therapy works differently. Protons can be aimed to stop exactly at the tumor — a point doctors call the "Bragg Peak." This precision matters most for children and patients with tumors near the brain or spine, where sparing nearby tissue is critical, according to Omaha World-Herald.
Nebraska Medicine chose a newer, smaller version of the technology. The Mevion S250-FIT system is more than 50% smaller than older machines, which sometimes required buildings the size of a city block. Instead of a massive rotating arm, it uses a rotating patient chair. Dr. Charles Enke, Chair of Radiation Oncology at UNMC, said the old machines were simply "a barrier" to bringing this care to Nebraska.
Nebraskans Once Drove 1,000 Miles for This Treatment
Before Saturday's delivery, the nearest proton centers were in Kansas City, Rochester, or St. Louis. Patients with rare tumors often had to relocate for six to eight weeks at a time. Will Steinauer, a former patient who now works at Nebraska Medicine, traveled 1,000 miles to Houston in 2020 to receive the same therapy that will soon be available down the street, KETV reported.
The new center will serve Nebraska, Iowa, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, and Colorado. Nationally, about 180,000 patients a year qualify for proton therapy. But only 9% currently receive it, largely because of where they live, according to internal data from UNMC. The Omaha facility is designed to close that gap for the region.
A Decade of Planning Behind Saturday's Crane Lift
Nebraska Medicine spent roughly 10 years studying whether proton therapy was feasible before committing. The hospital officially partnered with Mevion Medical Systems in September 2024. Construction broke ground in March 2025 at a cost of $36 million, funded through a mix of public and private sources including the University of Nebraska Foundation, according to BioSpace.
The crane lift on Saturday took about four hours, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. The cyclotron — the core component that generates the proton beam — weighs 15 tons on its own. The full integrated system tops 35 tons. Installation and testing will run through early 2027 before the first patients are seen.
Big Promise, Some Caution Around Costs and Coverage
Not everyone sees proton therapy as a clear win for all cancer types. Researchers writing in JAMA Oncology have questioned whether the technology is cost-effective for common cancers like prostate cancer, where standard radiation — which costs roughly half as much — often produces similar survival outcomes. Major insurers including UnitedHealthcare apply strict criteria before approving coverage, frequently denying it for cancers where older methods work just as well.
Still, supporters point to a future beyond current capabilities. Dr. Enke said the facility is built to be "FLASH research ready" — meaning it could one day deliver a full course of radiation in under two seconds using a cutting-edge technique called FLASH radiotherapy. Nebraska Governor Jim Pillen has backed the project as part of a broader $2.19 billion medical campus expansion he says will help Nebraska "set the standard" for healthcare across the rural Midwest, according to Omaha World-Herald.
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