Adolescent and Young Adult Survivors
Adolescent and young adult (AYA) survivors, often defined as being between the ages of 15-39, have seen advancements in technology and modern medicine causing a dramatic increase in the number of AYA survivors. Prior to 1970, being diagnosed with cancer during childhood was considered a universally fatal disease. From 1995 to 2000, however, the 5-year survival rate for children diagnosed with cancer was 80%. Significant progress has been built in the last 25 years as there are now approximately 270,000 survivors of pediatric cancer in the U.S., which translates to approximately 1 in every 640 young young adults being a survivor of childhood cancer. However, as studies have shown, as patient needs increase, the likelihood of having an unmet need also increases. For the AYA population, 2 out of 3 childhood cancer survivors will develop 1 complication due to the therapy they received and 1 out of 3 will develop serious or life-threatening complications, meaning they will most likely need treatment and follow-up care.
An AYA survivor, faces a variety of issues that are unique to their particular age group which differentiate their survivor population from the adult survivor population. Factors that impact educational attainment, employment, marriage and intimacy, fertility, and other life values differ in the emerging young adult compared with the older adult. Data show that AYA survivors have a much greater risk of getting a second primary malignancy as a side effect of the treatment for their original diagnosis. It is believed that AYAs have a much higher relative risk of developing a second primary cancer because the intensity of the treatment for their original diagnosis, typically including any combination of chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation, is much higher than the level of intensity given to patients over 40. Furthermore, since AYA survivors are diagnosed and treated at such a young age, their length of time being a survivor is much longer than their adult counterparts, making it more likely they will face a second primary cancer in their lifetime.
Read more about this topic: Cancer Survivors
Famous quotes containing the words adolescent, young, adult and/or survivors:
“Although good early childhood programs can benefit all children, they are not a quick fix for all of society’s ills—from crime in the streets to adolescent pregnancy, from school failure to unemployment. We must emphasize that good quality early childhood programs can help change the social and educational outcomes for many children, but they are not a panacea; they cannot ameliorate the effects of all harmful social and psychological environments.”
—Barbara Bowman (20th century)
“I have inspected the accommodations and find them entirely satisfactory, and as for those young men, who are of appropriate ages to be my grandsons, they will not trouble me in the least.”
—Catherine E. Beecher (1800–1878)
“This is no argument against teaching manners to the young. On the contrary, it is a fine old tradition that ought to be resurrected from its current mothballs and put to work...In fact, children are much more comfortable when they know the guide rules for handling the social amenities. It’s no more fun for a child to be introduced to a strange adult and have no idea what to say or do than it is for a grownup to go to a formal dinner and have no idea what fork to use.”
—Leontine Young (20th century)
“I want to celebrate these elms which have been spared by the plague, these survivors of a once flourishing tribe commemorated by all the Elm Streets in America. But to celebrate them is to be silent about the people who sit and sleep underneath them, the homeless poor who are hauled away by the city like trash, except it has no place to dump them. To speak of one thing is to suppress another.”
—Lisel Mueller (b. 1924)