Complete the Cure

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Complete the Cure

• Learning about childhood cancer

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What is Cancer?

• All types of cancer has to do with the cells that
  make up all human beings. Think of cells as the
  building blocks for our bodyour bones, muscles,
  organs, skin are all made up of cells.
• Cancer happens when cells that are not normal
  grow and spread very quickly

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What is Cancer?

• Sometimes all the cells form together in a tumor.
  This lump of cells damages normal cells and
  damages the bodys tissues.
• Other times cancer can be in the blood, like
  leukemia. Blood is made in bone marrow, the
  hollow core of bones. All blood cells start as
  stem cells.
• When a patient has leukemia it is because
  something has gone wrong with the cells in the
  bone marrow, and the leukemia cells grow quickly
  and crowd out the normal blood cells.

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Who Gets Cancer?

• You might know someone in your family who has
  cancer. There are many different types of cancer.
• Many adult cancers can be prevented by good
  healthy behavior like not smoking or wearing
  sunscreen.
• Some cancers are a mystery, especially cancers
  that affect children.

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Childhood Cancer

• Why do kids like these get cancer?

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Childhood Cancer Causes

• We dont know! But heres what we can say
• Very few kids get cancer.
• Thanks to doctors and researchers, over 80 of
  children live happy, normal lives after cancer
  treatment. Sixty years ago only 10 of children
  survived because doctors didnt know how to treat
  cancer.
• It is NEVER contagious. The cells are changing
  and we dont know why. Its very important that
  researchers and doctors try to figure out why the
  cells go bad.

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Treating Cancer

• If you know someone with cancer you may hear
  these terms
• Chemotherapy Medicine given to kill cancer
  cells over a number of weeks or months.
• Radiation therapy Uses high energy waves (like
  an X-ray) to damage and destroy cancer cells. It
  can cause tumors to shrink and even go away
  completely!
• These cancer treatments also kill healthy cells.
  This is why people may feel tired and sick. Many
  people think cancer causes your hair to fall out.
  It is actually the medicine that causes hair
  loss.

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Other Treatment

• Stem Cell transplant After all the
  chemotherapy to kill cancer, sometimes the body
  needs help repairing the damage and making new
  healthy cells. This requires a stem cell
  transplant.
• Three places to get stem cells to give to a
  patient
• From the healthy stem cells in the patient before
  chemotherapy.
• Donated bone marrow from relative or sometimes a
  stranger.
• Umbilical cord blood from a healthy baby (this
  does not affect the baby in any way. The
  umbilical cord is usually thrown away if it isnt
  donated).

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Remission

• This is a great word for anyone with cancer!
• It means all signs of cancer are gone from the
  body. Patients continue check ups to make sure
  the cancer doesnt return.

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What can I do?

• If a friend has cancer, there are many ways to
  help
• Visit in the hospital if they can have visitors.
• Send cards, emails, and pictures.
• Meet online and play games. Sometimes the
  hospital can be very boring!

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What can I do?

• Learn Watch a video or learn more ways to help
  at completethecure.org
• Fundraise Research is very important to improve
  treatments and find the causes of cancer. Go to
  completethecure.com for ideas.
• Share Tell your friends and family! The more
  people who know about childhood cancer and the
  need for research, the closer we will get to a
  cure so all kids can live happy, healthy lives.

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