Expanding
Dartmouth Cancer Center’s Impact

Reaching Across Northern New England

Cancer treatment can be one of the toughest challenges of someone’s life, and accessing the best treatment can sometimes add difficulty to an already trying time—particularly in rural northern New England. Some patients in our region must travel hours for care, and with treatment typically requiring frequent visits, simply getting there becomes a significant burden. That’s why Dartmouth Cancer Center has been expanding its footprint across the region, bringing high-caliber cancer care closer to home.

In southern New Hampshire, hundreds of patients now have convenient access to comprehensive cancer treatment and services at a new radiation oncology facility at the Dartmouth Hitchcock Clinics Manchester campus, which opened in July. This significant expansion brings chemotherapy and radiation therapy to patients locally, extending the same high level multi-specialty care available in Lebanon, N.H southward. Previously, patients often had to travel long distances for radiation therapy. Now, they can see their oncologists, get test results from the in-house lab, and receive their primary treatments in one convenient location.

Cancer care in southwestern Vermont is also being majorly reimagined, with the  construction of a new Dartmouth Cancer Center facility at Southwestern Vermont Medical Center (SVMC) in Bennington, Vt., a member of Dartmouth Health. SVMC broke ground in July for the new facility, which will be named the Hoyt-Hunter Center for Oncology Care. The state-of-the-art facility will double the number of infusion and exam rooms and enhance integration with Dartmouth Cancer Center. The Hoyt-Hunter Center is part of Vision 2020, SVMC’s capital campaign that has raised nearly $29 million for major renovation projects at the hospital.

For patients in the North Country of New Hampshire and the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont, the Cancer Center’s St. Johnsbury, Vt. location can save hours of driving. There, care is coordinated with local doctors and Cancer Center colleagues in Lebanon, N.H., and patients have access to radiation treatments, chemotherapy, clinical trials, holistic care, support groups, and educational programs, made possible by The Prouty. Now, in partnership with Northeastern Vermont Regional Hospital (NVRH) and with philanthropic support, Dartmouth Cancer Center is building a pathology lab at the St. Johnsbury facility to make it easier for patients get necessary lab work done as part of chemotherapy treatments and clinical trials. Funds raised through the Prouty Community Walk: St. Johnsbury are making it possible to better serve the northernmost communities in New England.

A Reimagined Hub for Cancer Care

If Manchester, N.H., Bennington, Vt., St. Johnsbury, Vt., and other Dartmouth Cancer Center sites are the spokes of the Dartmouth Cancer Center wheel, then Lebanon, N.H. is the hub, offering patients and clinicians alike a home base for cutting-edge research and clinical care. And the hub is undergoing changes, too.

The new Patient Pavilion at Dartmouth Health’s Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center (DHMC) in Lebanon will soon contain new and expanded facilities dedicated to cancer care, as construction is underway to complete floors left intentionally unfinished when the Pavilion opened in 2023. The second floor will be designed to support in-patient treatment of complex cancers that require multifaceted care regimes. A new, dedicated infusion space will be part of the in-patient facility, as well as ICU-convertible rooms equipped with advanced, real-time monitoring capabilities that can transform into positive airflow environments to provide patients receiving innovative, new immunotherapies, or stem cell or bone marrow transplants with a sterile, high-tech recovery hub.

This build-out will also support pioneering cell therapy research that builds on more than 25 years of Cancer Center-led discoveries. New facilities will fuel initiatives that marry foundational and translational research, clinical trials, and patient care to flip the script on how cancer is treated.

The existing 3K infusion space and clinic outpatient area, and the 2K radiation oncology space at the Norris Cotton Cancer Care Pavilion within DHMC are also being redesigned to increase clinical space while fostering a healing atmosphere that reflects the Cancer Center’s award-winning medical care. As those spaces are reimagined and expanded, a renovated comprehensive pediatric infusion suite and pediatric oncology treatment space will also be intentionally built to include spaces for play and privacy for families, in consideration of the many facets of providing cancer care to children. The plans also include an enhanced, dedicated space to support the unique needs of patients enrolled in clinical trials and provide them maximum comfort—allowing the Cancer Center to add more trials to its portfolio, meaning better care for patients.

One of the greatest champions of clinical trials at the Cancer Center has been Konstantin Dragnev, MD, professor of medicine and the Irene Heinz Given Professor in Pharmacology at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth and Dartmouth Health. Dr. Dragnev has stepped into the role of interim Cancer Center director after Steven D. Leach, MD, the Preston T. and Virginia R. Kelsey Distinguished Chair in Cancer at Dartmouth, became Geisel’s interim dean on September 15.

Dr. Dragnev is not only a beloved oncologist. Previously serving as associate director for Clinical Research and co-director of the Cancer Signaling, Genomes and Networks Research Program at the Cancer Center, and as the principal investigator for Dartmouth’s NCI Lead Academic Participating Site (LAPS) clinical trials grant since its inception, Dr. Dragnev has been instrumental in ensuring that patients have access to the most cutting-edge treatments.

Remembering Jack Hoopes, DVM, PhD

Jack, professor of surgery and radiation oncology at Geisel School of Medicine, adjunct professor of engineering at Thayer School of Engineering, beloved Dartmouth Cancer Center (DCC) member, and devoted Prouty Ultimate rider, passed away on Sunday, August 10, 2025.