Cancer Prevention & Treatment Related Articles & Blog Posts

Choices we make with our children can strongly influence their odds of getting cancer for the rest of their lives. Food, Nutrition, Physical Activity, and the Prevention of Cancer: A Global Perspective, released in November 2007, is comprehensive analysis of over 7000 different scientific studies.

Should all 11 and 12 year old girls be vaccinated against sexually transmitted human papillomavirus (HPV)? Michigan appears poised to be the first state to enact this requirement for all girls entering middle school (though parents could opt out for religious or medical reasons). Many other states are likely to follow suit quickly.

The breezy television ads for certain steroid-free eczema treatments have always bothered me. While they don.t say anything untrue, they do incorrectly imply that this treatment is gentler and safer than the more commonly used hydrocortisone. In March 2005 the United States FDA issued a public health advisory about a potential cancer risk from the [...]

Tobacco contains many compounds capable of damaging DNA and causing cancer. When a woman smokes during pregnancy, tobacco compounds from Mom’s bloodstream slip across the placenta. They can be found both in fetal blood and in the amniotic fluid that bathes the baby inside and out. We’ve known for some time that smoking during pregnancy [...]

The various studies looking at the effects of breastfeeding on childhood leukemia have had inconclusive and inconsistent results. Experts, led by Marilyn Kwan at the School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley, have taken 14 of these studies and analyzed them together as a group. This meta-analysis is published in the November 2004 Public [...]

How and when sun damage occurs to children’s skin may surprise you. Many parents know that in the United States alone more than 1 million skin cancers are diagnosed in adults each year, resulting from damage to the skin during childhood. Many of these cancers are deadly melanomas. Over the last thirty years, the frequency [...]

Pediatricians who treat cancer are poised to petition the World Health Organization to add leukemia medicines for children to the WHO essential drugs list, according to a February 16, 2004 report to the Agence de Presse Medicale. If the WHO does this, it could make a huge change for many families around the world.

Dr. Greene has been concerned about acrylamide since 2002 when The World Health Organization convened an emergency expert panel in to evaluate the potential health threats of acrylamide, a known toxic substance possibly created by heating starchy foods to high temperatures.

Because nicotine is both dangerous and addictive, physicians have been reluctant to use it in young children to help them quit smoking. It has not been studied in children younger than 16 — leading to the interesting irony that 12 and 13-year olds who smoke have a far easier time obtaining cigarettes than the treatment [...]

Tremendous strides have been made in treating children with cancer. I remember the time when most children with cancer died from their illness — now most live. But we must not ignore those who are still dying.