daniel chigunwe
Talent Gore
EXPERTS have called for parents and guardians to play their part, in the early detection and treatment of childhood cancer, to help save lives.
Childhood cancers cannot be prevented like other non-communicable diseases but can be cured with early and accurate diagnosis.
Common childhood cancers include kidney cancer (Wilms tumour), lymph glands (lymphomas), blood cancer (leukemia), bone cancer, brain tumour, and body lump (neuroblastoma).
The lack of knowledge and information on childhood cancers has resulted in most cases being presented late for treatment, making it difficult to successfully treat the children.
September is the Childhood Cancer Awareness Month and experts have called on parents and guardians to ensure children are screened for cancer early to improve their chances of survival.
Kidzcan Zimbabwe’s health and awareness coordinator, Charity Kawadza, said it was important for communities to be aware that children can get cancer.
“My advice to parents is that when a child is complaining of pain in any part of the body, take time to examine that area and listen to the type of complaint that they have,” she said.
“It is important for people to know that cancer can present itself in many symptoms, let’s improve our health-seeking behaviours for our children, when they complain, look at the pattern and length of the complaints.
“If you do some remedies at home to check if the problem has gone away or not, please go to the clinic or hospital.”
Kawadza said some of the challenges being faced, when it comes to childhood cancer, include late presentation.
“Early detection and treatment significantly improves survival rates, we need to talk about it and make childhood cancer a household name,” she said.
“People should not be afraid of childhood cancer, instead they should be able to say early detection is the best protection and refer to the child.”
According to the National Cancer Registry report, the number of children (ages 0-14) diagnosed with cancer in Zimbabwe stood at 293 in 2018.
While the figure might seem low, it could have been much higher had all the children with cancer been identified.
Paediatric Haemato-Oncologist at Parirenyatwa A4 Special Oncology Ward, Dr Patience Kuona, said globally childhood cancer is rare and one in 100 000 children will have cancer.
“This unit is the only one providing care to children with cancer in Zimbabwe, we have children who come from all over the country to seek care for childhood cancer,” she said.
“What we see is that our children are coming in very late but 80 percent of our children can actually be cured of cancer if they present early.
“Our parents, guardians and people from all walks of life do not know that children can also be diagnosed with cancer.
“That becomes a huge challenge because when children are brought to hospital late and diagnosed with cancer, their survival rate is reduced significantly.”
Online Reporter