Childhood Cancer Awareness Month: All You Need To Know About Pediatric Cancer - Dr Silky Jain
As per WHO, The most common types of childhood cancers include leukemias, brain cancers, lymphomas and solid tumours. Each year, approximately 400 000 children and adolescents of 0-19 years old are diagnosed with cancer, according to WHO. However, in many cases, childhood cancer is curable. The major hurdles in cancer treatment in India are advanced disease due to delayed diagnosis, inaccessible care in remote areas and treatment abandonment or refusal due to financial constraints. The most common cancer in childhood is leukemia (blood cancer), accounting for about one-third of all cases of childhood cancer in India, followed by brain tumours and lymphomas. Other common cancers seen in children are Wilms tumour (in kidneys), neuroblastoma (in adrenal gland), sarcomas (in muscles and bones), germ-cell tumours (in gonads) and retinoblastoma (in eyes). Symptoms Symptoms of blood cancer arise due to low hemoglobin causing pale skin and fatigue, low white cell count causing freq...