Tumours In Children

This book is a comprehensive and up-to-date compendium of all aspects of brain tumors in children. After introductory chapters on the epidemiology of brain tumors, the book will provide readers with state-of-the art chapters on the principals of radiation therapy, neurosurgery and neuroimaging. Subsequent chapters discuss the biology and treatment of specific types of brain tumors. The concluding chapters present critical information relevant to survivorship, neurocognitive and other late effects, and the global challenges to better diagnosis and treatment of brain tumors in children. This book is co-authored by experts in the treatment of pediatric brain tumors. All of the authors are internationally recognized authorities and they offer an evidence-based consensus on the biology and treatment of brain tumors. This handbook has far-reaching applicability to the clinical diagnosis and management of brain tumors in children and will prove valuable to specialists, generalists and trainees alike.

Over the last six decades, there has been tremendous improvement in the survival rate for the majority of children affected by cancer in the United States and in Western Europe. Despite dramatic advances in the “developed” world, 85% of children diagnosed with cancer globally will not survive this disease. Cancer in Children and Adolescents is an accessible textbook that covers the complexities and interdisciplinary nature of cancer occurrences and provides the fundamentals of diagnosis and management of cancers that affect children and adolescents. Distinguished for its global focus, many chapters in Cancer in Children and Adolescents are co-authored by recognized specialists from around the world. Cancer in Children and Adolescents is divided into four major sections: Section 1: The Laboratory Biology and Diagnostic Evaluation of Childhood Cancer Section 2: Principles of Cancer Therapy in Children Section 3: Tumors of Children Section 4: Supportive Care

Since the late 1960s, the survival rate in children and adolescents diagnosed with cancer has steadily improved, with a corresponding decline in the cancer-specific death rate. Although the improvements in survival are encouraging, they have come at the cost of acute, chronic, and late adverse effects precipitated by the toxicities associated with the individual or combined use of different types of treatment (e.g., surgery, radiation, chemotherapy). In some cases, the impairments resulting from cancer and its treatment are severe enough to qualify a child for U.S. Social Security Administration disability benefits. At the request of Social Security Administration, Childhood Cancer and Functional Impacts Across the Care Continuum provides current information and findings and conclusions regarding the diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis of selected childhood cancers, including different types of malignant solid tumors, and the effect of those cancers on childrenâ (TM)s health and functional capacity, including the relative levels of functional limitation typically associated with the cancers and their treatment. This report also provides a summary of selected treatments currently being studied in clinical trials and identifies any limitations on the availability of these treatments, such as whether treatments are available only in certain geographic areas.

This book, written by experts from across the world, provides a comprehensive, up-to-date overview covering all aspects of posterior fossa neoplasms in pediatric patients, including medulloblastoma, ependymoma, cerebellar astrocytoma, atypical teratoid/rhabdoid tumor, chordoma, brain stem tumors, and rarer entities. For each tumor type, individual chapters are devoted to genetics, radiological evaluation using advanced imaging techniques, surgery, pathology, oncology, and radiation treatment. In addition, a separate section describes the various surgical approaches that may be adopted and offers guidance on the treatment of hydrocephalus and the role of intraoperative mapping and monitoring. Useful information is also provided on anatomy, clinical presentation, neurological evaluation, and molecular biology. The book closes by discussing in detail immediate postoperative care, the management of surgical complications, and longer-term rehabilitation and support. Posterior fossa tumors are the most common pediatric brain tumors but are often difficult to treat owing to their proximity to critical brain structures and their tendency to cause marked intracranial hypertension. Practitioners of all levels of experience will find Posterior Fossa Tumors in Children to be a richly illustrated, state of the art guide to the management of these tumors that will serve as an ideal reference in clinical practice.

Cancer is the second commonest cause of death, after accidents, among children in developed countries, while in developing countries, improvements in the control of communicable diseases and the occurrence of premature delivery may lead to the emergence of cancer in children as a greater public health problem than in the past. The rationale for considering childhood cancers separately from cancers in adults in that there are differences in the sites of occurrence, in the histological appearance and in their clinical behavior. This book reviews the epidemiology of specific types of childhood cancer to mid-1997. The scale of the problem is first reviewed in a major compilation of data on the descriptive epidemiology of childhood cancer, then separate chapters describe studies of the different postulated causal factors and summarize what can be concluded from them.

With the fall in mortality from infectious diseases, the· impact of childhood cancer in the Western World has increased to become the second commonest cause of death in the age group 1-14 years, being surpassed only by accidents. However, even in those countries in which paediatric cancer is attracting increasing interest, the disease is relatively uncommon, and the number of cases seen by any one physician, even in a large general hospital, is often limited to one or two a year. The widely held view by parents and even by many doctors that cancer in childhood is usually untreatable and inevitably fatal is no longer tenable. With improvement in the therapeutic response or in the actual survival rates of children with such lesions as Wilms' tumour, brain tumours, rhabdomyosarcomas, Ewing's sarcoma, retinoblastoma, lym phoma and even leukaemia, there is a real hope of achieving a substantial reduction in the mortality of childhood cancer. Paediatric oncology is, in fact, providing a vigorous stimulus to the much wider field of cancer treatment and research, and is demonstrating the advantages of a multi-disciplinary cooperation in the management of this disease.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of the biological basis of renal tumors in childhood and the clinical approaches to their treatment. Recent advances in our understanding of the molecular genetics of Wilms and other renal tumors are placed in their clinical context, including the differing treatment approaches of immediate surgery or pre-operative chemotherapy. The challenges in applying this knowledge to improve risk stratification and to incorporate biologically targeted agents into front-line therapy are discussed. All of the authors are experts from Europe and North America and the book has been written specifically as an easy reference for the practising clinician and the research scientist. It lays the basis for understanding the future direction of clinical and translational research to improve outcomes in patients with childhood renal tumors and will prove indispensable for those treating or researching into these diseases.