The word "cancer" strikes fear in everyone who gets diagnosed. Cancer does not discriminate; people, sparing no ethnic group, female or male, no matter the age, are diagnosed. Sadly, there has been a significant increase in the cancer rate in children, of all people, over the years. Cancer is an abnormal growth of cells. Cancer cells rapidly reproduce despite restriction of space, nutrients shared by other cells, or signals sent from the body to stop reproduction. Cancer cells are often shaped differently from healthy cells, they do not function properly, and they can spread to many areas of the body. Tumors, which are abnormal growth of tissue, are clusters of cells that are capable of growing and dividing uncontrollably; their growth is not regulated. Tumors can be large or small. About one in 500 young adults is a childhood cancer survivor. Nearly 2/3 of the survivors later experience significant and chronic mental problems or develop secondary cancers that result from the treatment of their original cancer. (“Pablove Foundation”) Among the 12 major types of cancer, leukemia and brain tumors account for more than half of all cases. The median age at diagnosis is six years old. The average length of treatment for children, from initial diagnosis to cure or remission is three years. If the child experiences a relapse, the treatment time could be extended over many years with a potentially lowered prognosis. Some forms of pediatric cancer have a 5 year survival rate of more than 90%, while others have a 5 year survival rate of less than 2%. Cancer claims the lives of more children each year than AIDS, asthma, cystic fibrosis and diabetes combined. (“National Cancer Institute”) The increase in the cancer rate in children is gr...
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...ng the common causes of cancer in children, it becomes obvious that society and parents can not control all of the factors attributed to the increase in childhood cancers. However, we can as parents and as a society make an effort to lower the cancer rate in children, and in adults as well, by making lifestyle changes and choices that support prevention. While we can not control factors such as genetic disorders, we can promote awareness and implement behaviors such as avoiding exposure to pesticides and to high dose radiation when possible. We can strive to keep our children away from smoke, make efforts to teach them healthier eating habits and provide healthier choices for foods, and make an effort to use non toxic products. Individually and as a society, increased awareness of preventive measures could help significantly decrease the cancer rate in children.
Progress and innovation are key components to discover new possibilities to fight against childhood cancer. To begin with, my interest in healthcare sparked when I was diagnosed with childhood sarcoma cancer at the age of seven. As a cancer
Audre Lorde and Susan Sontag’s personal experience with cancer is depicted in their books with great detail; both describe obstacles those facing terminal illnesses must endure. Terminal disease distributes anxiety and fear among those facing death and it also carries social stigmas. Social stigmas placed on individuals diagnosed with terminal diseases are negative connotations or perceptions bestowed upon the terminally ill for bearing characteristics for which they are deemed different than the expected social norms. Both books outline the fear and uncertainty the terminally ill face daily. Lorde’s and Sontag’s purpose was to liberate those with cancer from silence and mystery. They felt it was necessary to give cancer a different perspective. The purpose of this paper is to compare how Susan Sontag’s Illness as a Metaphor and AIDS and Its Metaphors, and Audrey Lorde’s The Caner Journals, denounce society from metaphoric thinking.
Isn’t it overwhelming to consider the fact that approximately one in eight deaths in the world are due to cancer? To make this more comprehensible, the number of deaths caused by cancer is greater than caused by AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria combined. Along with the idea that this disease does not have a definite cure is a mind-staggering concept to grasp. If not caught in time, cancer means guaranteed death. These types of thoughts were floating around my head when my mother had told me that my father had mouth cancer.
An ordinary human body contains approximately one trillion cells and precisely 46 chromosomes in each cell. However, the human body can be altered by a genetic mutation. Over the course of history, genetic mutations have had a large impact on the human race. They have brought harm to numerous amounts of people. Cancer, in particular, is one of the most lethal diseases. Cancer begins when a portion of DNA inside a chromosome is damaged, causing a cell to mutate. Then, the mutated cell reproduces multiple times and creates a tumor. Afterwards, cancer cells break off of the tumor, enter the bloodstream, and disperse throughout the body. If the cells break off, the tumor is considered malignant - this type of cancer is very difficult to cure. Many patients today stay optimistic for a medication to heal cancer. It is imperative to address a few of the causes and effects of cancer in order to gain a general knowledge of genetic mutations.
Cancer is a word which evokes many different images and emotions. Nothing in this world can prepare a person for the utter devastation of finding out someone has been diagnosed with cancer, especially when this person is a child. Over the past twenty five years the amount of research and the survival rate for children suffering with cancer have increased dramatically. Despite these successes, the funding for new research necessary to keep these children alive and healthy is miniscule and too dependent on short term grants. Of the billions of dollars spent each year on cancer treatments and research less than a third is contributed to researching pediatric cancer. Given the media focus on adult cancers, research for pediatric cancer is underfunded. In order to maintain the increasing survival rate of the children undergoing pediatric cancer and support those who have survived the disease, better funding is quintessential to develop and further promote research.
Leukemia like any other cancer is devastating especially when it affects children and especially when they are too young to understand most of what is happening to their bodies. Facts like these are what should be used to motivate researchers and caregivers to help to make the process of treatment and care for patient dealing with disease one that is pleasant and supportive. The research should be taken seriously and it is hoped that in the future a cure can be found and the cause of the disease can be explained. It is also hoped that achievements like those can give families who are coping with disease or who have lost loved ones to the disease can find closure and solace in knowing that other may not have to go through what they have.
The East Pennsboro elementary school raised money for a statue at a local park. The statue was a ring of children that were holding hands. There was one child missing; the link was broken. The statue was dedicated to East Pennsboro students that did not make it to their graduation. My sophomore year of high school inspired this piece of artwork.
Many children in todays society could careless about the unhealthy things their putting into their bodies, but studies show that the more unhealthy things they eat and parents provide the more their at risk for diseases some can even be deadly.
Cancer develops when cells in a part of the body begin to grow out of
Childhood leukemia is a fast-growing cancer, most common in teens and children. It is cancer of the white blood cells. The affected cells for in the patient's bone marrow and very quickly travel through the bloodstream, attacking any healthy cells they encounter on the way. There are many things that may cause this cancer.. Some causes can be low immune system, and unhealthy environmental surroundings such as smoking. There are also some argued-about causes that are a bit on the controversial side, such as living near a nuclear power plant, or how old the patient’s mother was when they were born. The most common cause currently known is heredity.
Kids are meant to be happy, play outside, go to school, and have fun. They aren’t meant to sit in hospitals, losing weight by the pound, carrying around IV poles filled with poison. It’s ridiculous and immature that we don’t have a cure for childhood cancer. The only “treatment” that we have is chemotherapy- a chemical that seems to help fight off cancer. Chemo doesn’t just fight off cancer cells though- it fights off healthy cells in your blood, mouth, digestive system, and hair follicles. The most frustrating thing about childhood cancer is that only 4% of federal funding is exclusively dedicated to childhood cancer research. It is true that more adults get diagnosed with cancer than kids, but does that mean that adults are 96% more important than children? The average age of diagnosis for an adult with cancer is age 67, and the average number of years lost is 15. 15 years are definitely many years, but not that many compared to the average number of years lost for a child- 71. Also, age 67 is a lot older than the average age of diagnoses for a child- age 6. At least the adults get to grow up and have the ability to even have cancer- some of these kids can’t even get through a fifth of their lives.
Second Hand Smoke In the 1950's and 60's scientists gave the people a lot of evidence on the deadly effects of smoking where the tobacco companies on the other hand tried to put the doubt in people’s minds through the campaigns to show that it is not all true. By the time people actually decided to take care of their health and finally saw how life-threatening smoking could be by real life examples, the tobacco companies already got rich from its sales. Nowadays, nobody doubts that “firsthand” smoke is deadly to your health and it causes lung cancer and heart disease in adults and asthma and bronchitis in children. Now the industry is onto the secondhand smoke. Scientists and researchers are representing a lot of evidence and research that has been done throughout the years showing that the secondhand smoke can also cause a lung cancer in nonsmokers. The study has been done of people who have been long exposed to secondhand smoke and it shows that 26 out of 33 published studies indicate a link between secondhand smoke and lung cancer. The study estimates that the people that were breathing secondhand smoke were 8 to 150 percent more likely to get lung cancer. The tobacco companies are trying to argue the facts and are still in serious debate about the health hazards of breathing a secondhand smoke. A lot of anti-smoking organizations are trying to turn smoking in public into a private activity that does not have to involve nonsmokers breathing secondhand smoke. What is even more important is that many of these organizations convinced a lot of smokers to cut back or quit completely. The problem of secondhand smoke is increasing because it is so common in our society. It makes secondhand smoke the third-ranking cause of lung cancer among nonsmokers. Mothers who live with a smoking spouse have to realize the ill effects of secondhand smoke on children even before they are born. The smoking components reach the developing fetus through the mother. Infants that are born in a smoking environment weigh less and have a weaker chance of becoming a fully developed child. Secondhand smoke leads to blood clots and damages arterial linings which are the two most leading factors in the development of heart disease. The tobacco companies got scared of the effect that the secondhand smoke research can do to the cigarette makers.
When one hears the word “cancer”, thoughts about how their previous life is about to change cloud the mind, but when one hears the word cancer for their child, it is a whole different outlook; the affects of childhood cancer are not only taken on by the patients, but also by their families; the affects can range from emotionally to physically, socially to financially, and even educationally. “Childhood cancer is considered rare, especially compared with adults. Still it’s the leading cause of death in children pre-adolescent, school-aged children” (Report: Childhood Cancer Rates Continue to Rise, but Treatment Helps Drive Down Deaths). Around 12,000 children in the United States are diagnosed with cancer every year and around one in five children that are diagnosed with cancer will die.
Healthy eating is what we all need to consider in our everyday life. Healthy eating good prevent you from getting cancer, diabetes, and heart disease. There are many choices that we can make that can either benefit us or be hazardous to our health. There are many factors out there that can cause harm to the body. I have chosen three to discuss. What I am going to be talking about throughout my paper will be cancer, diabetes, and heart disease. I will be discussing what foods that would benefit and lessen your chance in getting these diseases. Also we will talk about the foods and other unhealthy choices that can increase your risk of getting these diseases. Eating healthy is what we need to teach our children and enforce it in your home. If we teach our children to start eating healthy at an early age then it could save them from having to struggle with getting these risk factors such as cancer, diabetes, and heart disease. We as parents need to instill good healthy eating habits for our children and make sure that our children are getting exercise of some sort on a daily basis. Adding exercise to your life will also lower your chances of becoming obese and having to worry about getting these risk factors.
Cardiovascular disease, cancer, and diabetes is said to account for nearly two of every three deaths in the U.S. Though there is a possibility of these diseases being prevented with a healthy lifestyle, there is no way to actually prevent the onset and progression of these conditions. Sadly, young children are being introduced to these unhealthy lifestyles and taking them right into adulthood; thus becoming walking billboards for the diseases. These diseases compromise health, shorten life expectancy, and cause enormous suffering, disability, and economic ...