In a message dated 7/23/01 9:55:08 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
<<
I think the difference between the two is that Kevin, the three-year-old,
had a very aggressive, fast-growing tumor, while Wayne, my father-in-law,
had a relatively slow one. Wayne's, unlike Kevin's, never metastasized.
Brain tumors are rare is children under 4 years of age. When they occur in
this age group they are almost invariably aggressive and usually cause death.
Tumors in the 5-15 year old group are more amenable to treatment. Even the
same pathologic tumor type (for instance medulloblastoma) is more aggressive
in younger children.
By the way, always be careful with statistics regarding how long people live
after diagnosis. For most types of cancer, those numbers are only going up
because of earlier diagnosis, not prolonged life, but the numbers get
misused.
Well, the effects of earlier diagnosis are important but it is not true that
the majority of improvements in outcome are simply the results of earlier
diagnosis. There are more effective treatments now and earlier diagnosis does
improve outcomes when the there is a treatment that works better when the
lesion is smaller and more localized.
(Along with Kevin's dad, I help manage of the larger cancer support mailing
lists on the net.)
Nick >>
