Fondazione Centro Nazionale Di Adroterapia Oncologica

The National Centre for Oncological Hadrontherapy (CNAO, sited in Pavia, Italy) is a hospital-based facility equipped with a custom synchrotron delivering high-energy scanning ion beams for the treatment of oncological diseases. CNAO is the only centre in Italy providing hadrontherapy with both protons and carbon ions, and one of the 6 dual particle facilities in the world. After an experimental clinical phase (2011-2014), in 2014 CNAO synchrotron achieved CE-mark approval and started fully clinical activity within the frame of the Italian National Health System. To date, CNAO has treated over 2800 patients affected by deep-seated tumors or ocular melanoma.

For STOPSTORM CNAO collaborates with IRCCSOSM. CNAO has collaborated in the past with IRCCSOSM on a project that included the cardiac follow-up of patients who received thoracic hadron therapy for cancer purposes, as well the usage of proton therapy to treat refractory ventricular arrhythmias. In the frame of ablative treatment of arrhythmias by RT, ion beams might offer the possibility to greatly reduce dose to surrounding healthy tissues, including critical cardiac substructures. This collaboration led, in December 2019, to the first-time worldwide STAR treatment using proton therapy.