# Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center

Source: https://onco.cc/institutions/heidelberg-ion-beam-therapy-center/  
OnCo record `heidelberg-ion-beam-therapy-center` (Institution). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

A radiotherapy centre at Heidelberg University Hospital that treats cancer with beams of charged particles (protons, carbon ions and, since 2025, helium ions) instead of ordinary X-rays. It opened in 2009 and has treated about 10,000 people, adults and children.

## Summary

HIT was opened on 2 November 2009 and treated its first patients on 15 November 2009. In the hospital's account it was the first facility in Europe to treat with both protons and heavy ions, which made comparative clinical studies possible. A synchrotron accelerates the ions to up to 75 per cent of the speed of light; two treatment rooms and a research room opened first, and a rotating gantry, 25 metres long, 13 metres wide and weighing 670 tonnes, was brought into service in 2012 so that the ion beam can be turned around the patient. A third ion source installed in 2013 added helium ions, used first for research, and in 2025 helium-ion irradiation entered clinical treatment alongside carbon ions and protons. The building cost 119 million euros, shared equally between Heidelberg University Hospital and the German federal government.

The centre treats selected cancers in adults, children and adolescents, with a stated focus on deep-seated or radioresistant tumours where sparing nearby healthy tissue matters, and is integrated with the hospital's radiation oncology department and linked to the National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT) Heidelberg. Its directors named on the hospital's timeline for the gantry opening were Jürgen Debus and Thomas Haberer. The hospital reports the 1,000th patient in July 2012, the 5,000th in August 2018 and about 10,000 by 2026.

## Fields

- Kind: Institution
- Last checked: 2026-11-03
- Also known as: HIT; Heidelberger Ionenstrahl-Therapiezentrum
- City: Heidelberg, DE
- Type: hospital
- Website: https://www.klinikum.uni-heidelberg.de/interdisziplinaere-zentren/heidelberger-ionenstrahl-therapiezentrum-hit

## Notes

- Oxygen ions: the hospital's 2005 timeline entry says the facility was designed to use helium, oxygen and carbon ions, but no page read states that oxygen ions are used clinically, so the record does not claim it.
- Thomas Haberer, named as co-director on the timeline, has no person record in the corpus, so only Jürgen Debus is linked.
- The patient counts and dates are the hospital's own timeline (German page), read on 3 November 2026.

## Sources

- HIT at Heidelberg University Hospital: https://www.klinikum.uni-heidelberg.de/interdisziplinaere-zentren/heidelberger-ionenstrahl-therapiezentrum-hit
- HIT history: https://www.klinikum.uni-heidelberg.de/interdisziplinaere-zentren/heidelberger-ionenstrahl-therapiezentrum-hit/ueber-uns/geschichte/
- Indications treated at HIT: https://www.klinikum.uni-heidelberg.de/interdisziplinaere-zentren/heidelberger-ionenstrahl-therapiezentrum-hit/fuer-aerzte/indikationen/

## Connected records

- technologies: [Carbon-ion synchrotrons and facilities](https://onco.cc/technologies/carbon-ion-synchrotrons/), [Carbon-ion therapy](https://onco.cc/technologies/carbon-ion/), [Proton therapy](https://onco.cc/technologies/proton-therapy/)
- institutions: [Heidelberg University Hospital / NCT / DKFZ](https://onco.cc/institutions/heidelberg-nct/)
- people: [Jürgen Debus](https://onco.cc/people/juergen-debus/)

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