BAMF Health Inc. founder and CEO Dr. Anthony Chang speaks at the formal launch of the company’s flagship cancer treatment facility in 2022 in Grand Rapids.
Securing another $5 million in state funding provides further financial backing to BAMF Health’s plan to develop a clinic in the city of Detroit for the advanced treatment of cancer and other diseases.
The Grand Rapids-based BAMF Health is “very close” to selecting a partner for a Detroit theranostics clinic that would cost “well north of $100 million” to develop and open by early 2027, said Chief Operating Officer Chad Bassett.
A decision on a partner for the project could come “in the coming months, if not weeks,” Bassett said, adding that a location is not yet finalized.
“We are looking at partner options with nearly every health system in the metro Detroit market, as well as with the academic medical centers and the schools, as well as other partners that are seeking to come to Detroit,” Bassett told Crain’s. “We’re open to all locations and the right partners, but nothing has been finalized yet. There are a number of sites.”
This year’s $5 million from the budget, which awaits Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s signature, is on top of $20 million lawmakers appropriated for the Detroit project in last year’s budget.
BAMF Health has been working with Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan’s office and the Detroit Economic Growth Corp. to select a location for a clinic that would join the Grand Rapids theranostics center that opened nearly two years ago on Michigan State University’s downtown research campus. At the time, BAMF executives expressed an interest in expanding into Detroit.
BAMF’s Grand Rapids clinic diagnoses and treats patients with stage four prostate cancer and neuroendocrine cancers using advanced high-speed medical scanners, radiopharmaceuticals and artificial intelligence to precisely target tumors with minimal side effects.
In Grand Rapids, BAMF partners with Corewell Health and MSU, the latter of which is developing a $335 million Health Sciences Research Center in Detroit through a partnership with Henry Ford Health.
The process to select a partner in Detroit remains “an open table,” although “there’s one that’s closer than others,” Bassett said. The company will likely select a single partner for the Detroit clinic, he added.
BAMF Health wants to establish a Detroit clinic “in the most optimal location so that we can be a resource to as many health systems as possible and as many of the schools in the area as possible,” Bassett said. The clinic would also need a location to readily serve patients who may cross the border from Canada for treatment, and that could leverage Detroit Metro Airport for patients who may travel there from distances, he said.
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BAMF’s Grand Rapids clinic has treated patients from more than 30 states and four other countries.
“We believe there will be an even bigger opportunity for international travel for healthcare when we’re located in better proximity to Detroit Metro Airport as well,” Bassett said.
BAMF Health is looking at several models for a Detroit partnership, including a joint venture where a partner “brings equity to the table or the ability to pledge assets as well,” or commits patient referrals, he said.
“We’re working in a variety of ways to look at what’s the best model to help as many patients as soon as possible,” said Bassett, adding that whoever BAMF Health chooses to work with in Detroit “comes down to patient access.”
“It’s imperative for us to partner with someone with the same mindset that we can move this precision medicine forward,” he said.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer speaks in 2022 as part of the formal launch of BAMF Health Inc.’s flagship cancer treatment facility in Grand Rapids.
Legislators appropriated the $5 million for BAMF Health as an earmark in the new state budget they completed early Thursday morning for the state’s 2025 fiscal year that starts Oct. 1.
The earmark combines with $20 million that lawmakers and Whitmer appropriated a year ago in the FY 2024 budget for a Detroit theranostics clinic. The additional funding originated with the office of state House Speaker Joe Tate, a Democrat from Detroit, with support from the governor and Senate Majority Leader Winnie Brinks, a Grand Rapids Democrat.
“Michigan — and specifically my community of Grand Rapids — is a leader in the healthcare space for good reason,” Brinks said in an emailed statement. ”In addition to providing access to world-class care, we also have a vision for the future of medicine. The team at BAMF develops lifesaving medical technologies and cancer therapies, and I’m a proud to help more people get state-of-the-art healthcare.”
Bassett explained that the political support for the funding results from a need to address health disparities and increase access to a modern-day form of molecular, precision medicine. As well, the state sees BAMF Heath’s work as helping to make Michigan attractive to pharmaceutical companies developing advanced treatments for disease.
“Our infrastructure is enabling additional investments in Michigan,” Bassett said. “There are several major pharmaceutical companies that are looking to come to Michigan and continue their development of radiopharmaceutical assets, and they needed to have this infrastructure in place on order for that to happen.
BAMF's planned Detroit clinic would join its theranostics center that opened nearly two years ago on MSU's research campus in downtown Grand Rapids.
BAMF Health hopes to begin treating patients in Detroit via small-scale clinical trials within 18 months in a temporary “mini” clinic with a partner, and to open a permanent clinic location in early 2027, Bassett said.
“We will help get patients access as soon as possible,” he said. “We have methods to do that with the partners we’re working on, just at a much smaller scale that we’re able to do once the full site is built.”
BAMF Health opened its first theranostics clinic in August 2022 at the Doug Meijer Medical Innovation building on MSU’s downtown Grand Rapids research campus.
The company plans to start treating earlier-stage prostate cancers by late 2024 or early 2025 and has about 20 clinical trials ongoing to use the technology on other forms of cancer, including lung, pancreatic, kidney, melanoma, sarcoma and neuroblastoma. BAMF Health also has a clinical trial occurring in Grand Rapids for cardiac imaging that could replace stress tests.
As well, BAMF Health uses the medical imaging technology on people with Alzheimer’s disease and within 60 days will start treating Alzheimer’s patients in Grand Rapids with a new drug, Leqembi, that’s administered through infusion, Bassett said.
Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis AG has designated BAMF Health as a global center of excellence for its entire clinical trial pipeline.
This story first appeared in Crain's Grand Rapids Business.
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