"The IU Health Proton Therapy Center has the support of a great national institution in the IU School of Medicine and a powerhouse of a regional health network in IU Health. That’s a lot of potential to tap into."

Peter Johnstone, MD

Position:

President and CEO

Specialty:

Prostate and breast cancer, staff physician

As the country grapples with healthcare reform, Dr. Peter Johnstone, IU Health Proton Therapy Center president and CEO, remains optimistic about the future of proton therapy in Bloomington, Ind.

“Proton therapy is a unique opportunity for Indiana, and it is not available at many other places in the country,” says Dr. Johnstone. “We have a stable, solid workforce; experienced physicists and staff operating our proton beam; the support of a great national institution in the Indiana University School of Medicine; and a powerhouse of a regional health network in Indiana University Health. That is a lot of potential to tap into.”

At the helm of the IU Health Proton Therapy Center since September 2008, Dr. Johnstone believes proton therapy will remain available in just a handful of regional centers, which bodes well for the Bloomington facility.

“We are in a very advantageous position,” he explains. “What we have to do is get the word out to the patients who can benefit from this unique treatment. Proton therapy is a marvelous opportunity for pediatric patients and for patients with head and neck and brain cancer.”

Just as many consumers have the misperception that proton therapy is a “new” or “experimental” therapy, many doctors are unaware of the advantages proton therapy can offer cancer patients. Unfortunately, some referring physicians are not yet suggesting proton therapy – which may involve moving away from home to Bloomington for a period of weeks – as a treatment option for patients. “If a patient leaves their hometown for proton therapy, that community loses the healthcare dollars that would have been spent locally on cancer treatment,” explains Dr. Johnstone. “But…there are cadres of patients for whom proton therapy makes perfect sense.”

To help educate members of the medical community, Johnstone is increasing the IU Health Proton Therapy Center’s emphasis on research, both through publications and presentations at national and international medical meetings. Dr. Johnstone, who possesses the perfect combination of skills to lead and promote the IU Health Proton Therapy Center to the world: he has degrees in both communications and medicine, has spent the last 20 years working as an administrator, grant-funded researcher and professor/practitioner of radiation oncology.

During more than a quarter of a century of service in the U.S. Navy, Dr. Johnstone served as both director of clinical support services and as chief of radiation oncology at San Diego’s Naval Medical Center. In between, he managed multi-million dollar projects and facilities including the Navy Medical Center San Diego Breast Health Center – which won the 1999 Wyeth-Ayerst Gold HERA Award for excellence in women's health care – and eventually became an advisor on radiation oncology to the Navy’s Surgeon General.

Internationally known as an expert in prostate cancer, he has authored hundreds of peer-reviewed articles, abstracts and scientific posters in addition to serving for nearly a decade as editor-in-chief of the journal Current Problems in Cancer.

Despite his myriad of accomplishments, Dr. Johnstone says nothing could surpass the opportunity work with the IU Health hospitals and affliates and the IU School of Medicine.

“It is a great gig,” he says. “There is nothing better.”

STATS

• BS, chemistry, United States Naval Academy, Annapolis, Md.
• MA, communication, University of Oklahoma – Norman
• MD, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, Md.
• Chair and William A. Mitchell Professor of Radiation Oncology, Indiana University School of Medicine
• Director, Indiana University Cyclotron Operations
• President, American Radium Society
• President, Society for Integrative Oncology (2007)
• Board certified in radiation oncology
• Author of six book chapters, more than 130 peer-reviewed papers, and more than 100 scientific posters
• Fellow of the American College of Radiology
• Previous appointments at Atlanta’s Emory University School of Medicine and Emory Winship Cancer Center; Grady Memorial Hospital; Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, Md.; and University of California – San Diego