The Acreage Cancer Study

Hi Everyone,

The month of September is Childhood Cancer Awareness month. For us, childhood cancer awareness occurs every day. This is obviously the reason this website is here. We encourage you to learn more about childhood cancer (not just pediatric brain cancer) and see what you can do to help.

Below are several articles that may be of interest to you. We hope you enjoy them.

Have a great day!

Courtesy of CureSearch.org:

The objective of Childhood Cancer Awareness Month is to spotlight childhood cancer and survivorship issues related to childhood cancer nationally. CureSearch is dedicated to leading the way in advocacy and fundraising for childhood cancer research and awareness.

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St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital doctors and scientists team up to fight childhood cancer

Memphis, Tennessee, September 1, 2010

Survival rates overall for childhood cancer are almost 80 percent—a marked advance against a disease that was curable in only a small fraction of children 50 years ago. However, despite progress, pediatric cancer remains the leading cause of death due to disease among U.S. children older than 1year of age.

While September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month nationwide, at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, the fight against this disease is a year-round mission. Doctors and scientists work together not only to improve survival rates for childhood cancer, but to develop better, safer therapies to treat the disease.

“Two major efforts define our mission. One of those is to provide the best care today for every child who comes to St. Jude,” said Dr. William E.Evans, St. Jude director and CEO. “The other is to conduct research that makes treatments better tomorrow.”

For its efforts, St.Jude was named the nation’s top children’s cancer hospital in 2010–11,receiving the best overall score summarizing quality of care in asurvey from U.S. News & World Report. That ranking wasbased on the hospital’s performance in three areas: reputation; medicaloutcomes such as cancer survival; and care-related indicators ofquality such as the number of patients, nursing staff and other factors.

To view the full article, Click Here.

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Courtesy of CandleLighters.org:

WHY RESEARCH IS NEEDED

Cancer knows no boundaries and as such affects children throughout the world. It is estimated that about 160,000 children world-wide are diagnosed with cancer each year, and approximately 90,000 will eventually die from their illness.1  The exact number of new cases is not known because the number of children with cancer is not registered in many countries.

In developed countries like the United States , Canada , Western European countries, Japan and Australia , cancer remains the most common disease killer of children. In developing countries, more than one in two children diagnosed with cancer are likely to die.2 This is because cancer is detected late and only a small proportion of children have access to the comprehensive cancer treatments currently available in the developed world. Childhood cancer is becoming a more important health issue for these countries and the world community as infectious diseases and diarrhea become increasingly eliminated.

In the U.S. and other developed countries, the 1970s-80s brought the advent of chemotherapy ‘cocktails’ applied to childhood cancer, where toxic compounds that preferentially killed the tumor cells kept many children from death. In spite of tens of millions of public dollars being allocated towards clinical trial research in the U.S. in the past decade, there has been no change in survivorship of childhood cancer in the past 10 years.2  From 1975 to 1998 the annual death rate from childhood cancer in the U.S. declined at a rate of 2.7% per year. Despite very aggressive therapiesthat approach the limits of tolerability for the child, the overallsurvival rate for childhood cancer has remained unchanged since 1998. One in four children who are diagnosed with cancer in the U.S. will die within five years of their diagnosis, and 30% of those that do survive have severe side effects, including cognitive deficits, kidney failure, heart failure, and secondary cancers caused from the traditional toxic treatments.  Because of the high level of toxicity associated with many current treatments and the plateau in survivorship rates, future success is dependent upon the development of new therapeutic approaches.

To view the full article, Click Here.

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Ways YOU Can Help:

Donate to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital by Clicking Here.

Donate to the Make-A-Wish Foundation by Clicking Here.

Donate to the Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation by Clicking Here.

Donate to Miami Children's Hospital by Clicking Here.

Donate to the American Brain Tumor Association by Clicking Here.

Donate to the Florida Brain Tumor Association by Clicking Here.

Donate to the Duke Children's Hospital by Clicking Here.