Childhood Cancer
By: Amanda Bone
July 11, 2010
HCA/240
Bruce Gould

The body is made up of hundreds of millions of living cells. Normal body cells grow, divide, and die in an orderly fashion. During the early years of a person’s life, normal cells divide faster to allow the person to grow. After the person becomes an adult, most cells divide only to replace worn-out or dying cells or to repair injuries. Cancer begins when cells in a part of the body start to grow out of control. There are many kinds of cancer, but they all start because of out-of-control growth of abnormal cell (American Cancer Society, 2010). About 10,730 children in the United States under the age of 15 were diagnosed with cancer in 2009 (American
It usually occurs in children under the age of four, and is seldom found in children older than six (American Cancer Society, 2010). Primary bone cancers occur most often in children and adolescents. Primary bone cancer is different from metastatic bone cancer, which is cancer that has spread from another site to the bone. Metastatic bone cancer is more common than primary bone cancer because many types of cancer can spread to the bone. The two types of primary bone cancers that occur in children are: osteosarcoma is uncommon, accounting for almost 3% of all new childhood cancer cases in the United States. The second type is Ewing sarcoma which is a less common primary bone cancer which can cause bone pain. It is mostly found in adolescents. It accounts for a little more than 1% of childhood cancers (American Cancer Society, 2010). The risk factor and causes of childhood cancer is anything that changes your chances of getting a disease such as cancer. Different cancers have different risk factors. Lifestyle-related risks are thought to be the main factors that affect cancer risk in adults. Lifestyle-related risk factors have little or no affect on childhood cancer. Preventing childhood cancer is the same as the risk factors for childhood cancer there is no one thing that can be the main cause of childhood cancer. Unlike many cancers of adults, there are no avoidable risk factors that are known to influence your child’s risk of