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News Release

October 7, 2008

Contact: Chris DeFrancesco, 860-679-3914
e-mail: cdefrancesco@uchc.edu

Neag Gift to Revolutionize Imaging, Treatment

$3.8 Million Pledge Enabling UConn Health Center to Open Integrated Suite

FARMINGTON, CONN. – The University of Connecticut Health Center will use a $3.8 million gift to create an integrated imaging and treatment suite that will enhance patient care, particularly in cancer and cardiology.

The pledge comes from Torrington natives Carole and Ray Neag, whose history of philanthropic support includes more than $42 million in gifts to the university.

The Carole and Ray Neag CT Scanner Suite will combine the latest multi-slice computed tomography technology with advanced supporting technology. It will make the UConn Health Center the first in the region to offer patients a continuum of diagnostic, planning and treatment services.

“The suite’s functionality for cardiology alone will be leaps and bounds beyond our existing capabilities,” says Dr. Bruce Liang, director of the Pat and Jim Calhoun Cardiology Center.

Advantages of the new scanner include clearer images, a reduction in scanning times by about 90 percent, and selective presentation of a scanned image, allowing a physician to, for example, isolate the image of a heart without including arteries and vessels that may be blocking the view.

The treatment tools will include new high dose rate brachytherapy, the placement of controlled radioactive implants internally near cancer cells. HDR brachytherapy enables physicians to treat breast, cervical, uterine and other cancer patients on an outpatient basis. Traditional brachytherapy requires several days of bed rest.

“The addition of HDR dramatically increases our ability to give cancer patients treatment options,” says Dr. Robert Dowsett, chief of the Health Center’s Division of Radiation Oncology. “It is becoming the standard of care, and offers major improvements in patient convenience and comfort.”

The new suite also will include a CT simulator to enable more efficient, convenient and accurate treatment planning for all cancer patients.

“Carole and I take a broad view about the need to serve the people of Connecticut,” Ray Neag says. “We feel strongly about the state and its university, and believe that our state’s flagship research university should have the very best if at all possible.”

“The Neags’ generosity has made a huge difference to UConn and the patients who depend on us every day,” says Dr. Douglas Fellows, chair of the Health Center’s Department of Diagnostic Imaging and Therapeutics.

UConn Health includes the schools of medicine and dental medicine, the UConn Medical Group, University Dentists, and John Dempsey Hospital. Home to Bioscience Connecticut, UConn Health pursues a mission of providing outstanding health care education in an environment of exemplary patient care, research and public service. More information about UConn Health is available at www.uchc.edu.

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