New Casita for Cancer Patients Planned on Phoenix Campus of Mayo Clinic

Monday, March 26, 2012

Phoenix — Mayo Clinic in Arizona and the American Cancer Society have announced that construction is projected to begin in the fall of 2012 for a new casita at the Village at Mayo Clinic to house patients who need to travel long distances for cancer therapy in the Valley.

This will mark the fifth casita at the Village, located on the southeast corner of the Phoenix campus of Mayo Clinic. Three casitas currently house Mayo Clinic transplant patients and now two casitas will house cancer patients. The new, approximately 10,000-square-foot American Cancer Society casita will be the first two-story casita on the four-acre Village site. Twelve bedrooms and bathrooms will serve cancer patients and their caregivers. The two-story casita will also include kitchens, great rooms, dining areas, laundry, libraries and an elevator.

The collaboration among Mayo Clinic, the American Cancer Society and the Arizona Transplant House builds on their combined commitment to provide unique housing, friendship and a healing environment for patients.

The new casita for cancer patients complements the original Phoenix Hope Lodge on the Village at Mayo Clinic site, and is operated by the American Cancer Society.

This is the first such hospitality housing concept for cancer patients in the Western states. The three other casitas at the Village are operated by the Arizona Transplant House to house out-of-town patients awaiting — or recuperating from — a solid organ or bone marrow transplant.

Funding for the new Phoenix Hope Lodge casita has been provided by Mayo Clinic benefactors who believe in the mission of the collaboration between Mayo and the American Cancer Society for the Village project and a serene setting for transplant and cancer patients. Mayo Clinic will own and construct the building and will lease the new casita to the American Cancer Society. The first Hope Lodge casita opened at the Village in September 2009, shortly after the first transplant patients moved from their former home-away-from-home in Scottsdale at the Arizona Transplant House at Brusally Ranch, a one-time Arabian horse ranch that was donated to Mayo Clinic.

The new American Cancer Society casita will house cancer patients from throughout the Valley. The American Cancer Society Hope Lodge currently provides a home-away-from-home for hundreds of patients and their caregivers each year during their extended stay in Phoenix for cancer treatment.

The addition of this second American Cancer Society Hope Lodge casita on the site of the Village at Mayo Clinic will potentially benefit cancer patients whose conditions can be treated by the proton beam facility under construction on the Phoenix campus of Mayo Clinic. Proton beam therapy is an advanced treatment using pencil beam scanning, allowing for more precise dosage of radiation to the tumor, sparing surrounding tissue. Because fewer than 10 such proton beam facilities exist in the U.S., the Arizona facility is expected to be a destination for cancer patients who come from outside the Phoenix area.

About the American Cancer Society

We save lives and create more birthdays by helping you stay well, helping you get well, by finding cures, and by fighting back. To learn more about us or to get help, call us any time, day or night, at 800-227-2345.

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