California Cancer Associates for Research and Excellence (cCARE), California’s largest independent group of cancer and hematology doctors, has announced plans to develop a 65,000-square-foot cancer center with Saint Agnes Medical Center on its Fresno campus.

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The comprehensive outpatient center will offer cancer care and hematology services that include radiation therapy, a high-complexity medical lab, chemotherapy, imaging and a physician dispensing program for oral oncology drugs.

cCARE, which boasts more clinical trials than some academic medical centers, expects the new center to be the largest and most advanced of its kind managed by a private medical practice in California’s Central Valley.

Planning between cCARE and Saint Agnes has been underway for months and builds upon an existing relationship between the two entities.

“Healing body, mind and spirit has been our mission for more than eight decades,” said Nancy Hollingsworth, CEO of Saint Agnes Medical Center. “Our commitment to providing the very best in cancer care has never wavered and we are excited to align even more closely with this exceptional group of physicians.”

Plans call for a 31,000-square-foot expansion and renovation of Saint Agnes’ existing Cancer Center, where physicians from cCARE have been practicing for more than 20 years.

Construction, which will take place in stages, is scheduled to break ground in October, with a projected duration of 12 to 15 months.

Saint Agnes Medical Center will continue to provide a full range of inpatient medical and surgical cancer services, as well as outpatient supportive services, including genetic counseling, social and nutritional services, an adult sickle cell clinic, a nurse navigator program and lymphedema treatment.

The new facility will be called ‘cCARE at Saint Agnes’ and will be independently managed and operated by cCARE, a private practice of 25 physicians and 10 nurse practitioners.

The staff and operations from cCARE’s two current Fresno locations on East Fir and North Millbrook avenues will merge into one cCARE at Saint Agnes cancer center.

cCARE will also continue to operate its seven other locations in the San Diego area.

“Our physicians, nurse practitioners, and staff will continue working shoulder to shoulder with our colleagues at Saint Agnes as well as at other hospitals throughout southern and central California,” said Troy Simon, cCARE’s chief executive officer.