LAS VEGAS (AP) - A property restriction dating to 2003 could scuttle efforts to keep the Nevada Cancer Institute operating in Las Vegas.

The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports that Comprehensive Cancer Centers of Nevada halted negotiations this week after six months of talks with institute owner University of California San Diego Health System.

Comprehensive Cancer Centers wanted to lease more than one-fourth of the institute's flagship building, plus take on a sizable but unspecified number of patients and staff.

But a restriction placed at the time Howard Hughes Properties Inc. sold the property to the Nevada Cancer Institute allows only a nonprofit medical facility on the site.

Comprehensive Cancer Centers is a for-profit business.

UCSD Health System bought the Nevada Cancer Institute in January through a Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceeding.

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