powering cures, realizing futures

The Need

Kids Cancers and Adult Cancers Are Different

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Worldwide, 400,000 children are diagnosed with cancer each year. In the U.S., more children die of pediatric cancer than any other disease.

Whether it is your child, a neighbor or the relative of a colleague, chances are strong that someone you know will have their lives shattered by pediatric cancer. We are working to mitigate your despair the only way we know how: by advancing science.

One of the most important facts to understand is that pediatric cancers and adult cancers are different. Childhood cancers do not behave the same way as adult cancers. Additionally, adult treatments have a different impact on developing bodies and children may respond differently to drugs that control symptoms in adults. Even so, a scarcity of research funding forces children to rely on adult oncology regimens – many of which are decades old and may even be deadlier than their disease.

Understanding Pediatric Cancers

  • Behavior and lifestyle rarely, if ever, factor into why a child develops cancer
  • When kids are treated for cancer, they deal with the late-effects of treatment for the rest of their lives. Common
    late-effects of childhood cancer treatment include:
mind

Mental health issues

brain

Memory loss

ear

Hearing loss

heart

Heart and other organ damage

baby

Infertility

person using walker

Nerve damage, pain and weakness

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Stunted bone growth

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Increased risk of secondary cancers

  • There are more than a dozen different types of pediatric cancers and countless subtypes. Even though research has
    made great strides in certain cancers, like Lymphoma, too many others have no known treatment…yet
  • Funding for childhood cancer research is harder to secure, even though the incidence of childhood cancer is rising

Explore the Boxes Below to Become Familiar with Key Facts and Statistics About Pediatric Cancer

*PCRF uses cancer.gov as our primary source of information

#1

Cause of death by disease for children under the age of 20 in the U.S.

1 in 285 American Children

Will be diagnosed with cancer by the time they are 20

Every Two Minutes

A family and their child is told of a cancer diagnosis

70 %

That’s the amount overall survival rates have improved in the past 40 years due to research

About 84 Percent

Of pediatric cancer patients today are cured

2 Reasons Why More Children Don't Survive Today

1) Current therapies are simply too potent
2) Some cancers have no cures...yet

2/3

Of childhood cancer survivors will have long-lasting chronic health conditions from treatment

5%

Of oncology treatments have been tested for first-time use in children

More than One Disease

There are over a dozen types of childhood cancer and countless subtypes

#2

Brain tumors are the 2nd most common type of childhood cancer

Only 4%

Of the Federal government’s cancer research budget is directed towards pediatric cancer

About 50%

Of all pediatric cancer research is funded by philanthropies supported by donors, corporations and foundations
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