Optimising the treatment of eye tumours
Villigen, 08.12.2025 — The Insel Group and the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI are expanding their collaboration to provide faster and better coordinated access to proton therapy for patients with eye tumours. The two institutions have signed a new cooperation agreement, creating an integrated patient pathway that offers patients medically coordinated, high-precision treatment and improves the long-term quality of the care they receive.
The new contract ensures that patients with tumours in the eye region, especially uveal melanomas, are identified at an early stage by Bern University Hospital (Inselspital) and swiftly incorporated into the specialised treatment procedures available at PSI. Standardised procedures, regular interdisciplinary case discussions and coordinated aftercare ensure uninterrupted medical supervision – from the first suspicion to long-term monitoring. For patients, this means faster treatment, greater safety and reliably coordinated medical care.
“This integrated patient pathway will not only reduce the time until treatment but also ensure maximum safety for our patients through seamless collaboration between all the different specialists,” says Florian Heussen, Senior Consultant at the Department of Ophthalmology, Bern University Hospital.
Precise treatment with maximum protection of the eye
Proton therapy is one of the most advanced forms of radiotherapy. It allows tumours to be irradiated with sub-millimetre precision while at the same time protecting the surrounding healthy tissue as much as possible. This is a decisive advantage when treating the eye, which is extremely sensitive. “Our cooperation improves access to a treatment that can preserve the eye and the patient’s vision in complex cases”, says Damien Weber, Chief Physician and Head of the Center for Proton Therapy at PSI
Pooling expertise for the direct benefit of patients
The agreement combines the strengths of two leading institutions: PSI as one of the internationally most renowned centres for proton therapy and Inselspital, whose University Comprehensive Cancer Center Inselspital (UCI) plays a central role in ocular oncology throughout Switzerland. The structured exchange and joint planning provide rapid, direct access to highly specialised care, setting a new quality standard for patients with eye tumours.
Text: Joint press release by the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI and the Insel Group
About PSI
The Paul Scherrer Institute PSI develops, builds and operates large, complex research facilities and makes them available to the national and international research community. The institute's own key research priorities are in the fields of future technologies, energy and climate, health innovation and fundamentals of nature. PSI is committed to the training of future generations. Therefore about one quarter of our staff are post-docs, post-graduates or apprentices. Altogether PSI employs 2300 people, thus being the largest research institute in Switzerland. The annual budget amounts to approximately CHF 450 million. PSI is part of the ETH Domain, with the other members being the two Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology, ETH Zurich and EPFL Lausanne, as well as Eawag (Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology), Empa (Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology) and WSL (Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research).
Contact
Prof. Dr. med. Damien Charles Weber
Head and Chief Physician of the Center for Proton Therapy
Paul Scherrer Institute PSI
+41 56 310 58 28
damien.weber@psi.ch
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