Hope Lodge is a charitable project run by the American Cancer Society (ACS) offering cancer patients and their caregivers a free place to stay when they are being treated in another location away from home. Patients staying at a Hope Lodge must be in active cancer treatment, and permanently reside more than 40 miles or one hour away from their cancer treatment center. Each patient must be accompanied by a caregiver.
Established in 1970, the Charleston, South Carolina Hope Lodge was the first facility to open. The concept came from Margot Freudenberg, a leader in the Charleston medical and business communities, who saw a similar facility while traveling through Australia and New Zealand with U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower's People to People Ambassador Program.[1] ACS's Hope Lodge Network has expanded into more than thirty locations throughout the United States. There is also a Hope Lodge unit in Puerto Rico. Lodging and most services are offered free of charge.