Cancer Health Center

Fortunately, cancer in children and adolescents is rare, although the overall incidence of childhood cancer has been slowly increasing since 1975.[1] Children and adolescents with cancer should be referred to medical centers that have a multidisciplinary team of cancer specialists with experience treating the cancers that occur during childhood and adolescence. This multidisciplinary team approach incorporates the skills of the primary care physician, pediatric surgical subspecialists, radiation therapists, pediatric oncologists/hematologists, rehabilitation specialists, pediatric nurse specialists, social workers, and others to ensure that children receive treatment, supportive care, and rehabilitation that will achieve optimal survival and quality of life. (Refer to the PDQ Supportive and Palliative Care summaries for specific information about supportive care for children and adolescents with cancer.)

Guidelines for pediatric cancer centers and their role in the treatment of pediatric patients with cancer have been outlined by the American Academy of Pediatrics.[2] At these pediatric cancer centers, clinical trials are available for most types of cancer that occur in children and adolescents, and the opportunity to participate in these trials is offered to most patients/families. Clinical trials for children and adolescents with cancer are generally designed to compare potentially better therapy with therapy that is currently accepted as standard. Most of the progress made in identifying curative therapies for childhood cancers has been achieved through clinical trials. Information about ongoing clinical trials is available from the NCI Web site.

Dramatic improvements in survival have been achieved for children and adolescents with cancer. Between 1975 and 2002, childhood cancer mortality has decreased by more than 50%.[1] Childhood and adolescent cancer survivors require close follow-up since cancer therapy side effects may persist or develop months or years after treatment. (Refer to Late Effects of Treatment for Childhood Cancer for specific information about the incidence, type, and monitoring of late effects in childhood and adolescent cancer survivors.)

Hepatoblastoma and Hepatocellular Carcinoma

Epidemiology

Liver cancer is a rare malignancy in children and adolescents and is divided into two major histologic subgroups: hepatoblastoma and hepatocellular carcinoma. The incidence of hepatic tumors in children 14 years and younger is 2.4 per 100,000, of which 2 per 100,000 are hepatoblastoma.

The incidence of hepatoblastoma in the United States appears to have doubled in the last 25 years, whereas the incidence of hepatocellular carcinoma in the United States has minimal variance between the ages of 0 and 19 years and has not changed appreciably over time.[3,4] The cause for the increase in incidence of hepatoblastoma is unknown, but the increasing survival of very low birth weight premature infants, which is known to be associated with hepatoblastoma, may contribute.[5] In Japan, the risk of hepatoblastoma in children who weighed less than 1,000 g at birth are 15 times the risk in normal birth weight children.[6] Other data has confirmed the high incidence of hepatoblastoma in very low birth weight premature infants.[7]