Rx News

Childhood Cancer

September 30, 2015

Thousands of kids are diagnosed with cancer each year across the United States. Cancer is the leading cause of death by disease for children under the age of 15. In the U.S. one out of every five children with cancer will not survive. This month, we remember the young lives taken too soon, stand with the families facing childhood cancer today, and rededicate ourselves to combating this terrible illness. Doctors often send their toughest cases to St. Jude because they have the world's best survival rate for some of the most aggressive childhood cancers.

10 most common types of childhood cancer:

1. Leukemia (acute lymphoblastic leukemia and acute myeloid leukemia)
2. CNS, brain, and spinal cord tumors
3. Lymphomas, (including Hodgkin and non-Hodgkin lymphoma)
4. Skin cancer and melanomas
5. Soft tissue tumors (including rhabdomyosarcoma)
6. Germ cell tumors
7. Neuroblastoma
8. Bone cancers (including osteosarcoma and Ewing sarcoma)
9. Renal cancer (including Wilms tumor)
10. Retinoblastoma

Facts about Childhood Cancer:

• Cancer treatments can affect a child's growth, fertility, and endocrine system.
• Radiation to a child's brain can significantly damage cognitive function, or if radiation is given at a very young age, limiting the ability to read, do basic math, tell time or even talk.
• 35,000 children are currently in treatment for cancer.
• More children die of cancer every year than adults that died in 9/11.
• The average age of death for a child with cancer is 8, causing a child to lose 69 years of expected life.
• Some 25% of all kids who are diagnosed with cancer die.
• 35,000 children are currently in treatment for cancer.

Facts about Childhood Cancer Survivors:

• 74% of childhood cancer survivors have chronic illnesses, and some 40% of childhood cancer survivors have severe illnesses or die from such illnesses.
• Childhood cancer survivors are at significant risk for secondary cancers later in life.
• Child survivors may be permanently immunologically suppressed.
• 1 in 530: The number of adults aged 20 to 39 who are childhood cancer survivors.