•Childhood cancers has been on the rise globally being diagnosed in 385,509 cases yearly in children aged zero to 19 years.
•When diagnosed early enough and treated with the appropriate protocols, up to 80 per cent of childhood cancers are curable.
Image: PEXELS / MONSTERA
Health experts have now attributed poor handwriting and lack of coordination to a warning sign of childhood cancer.
Irene Nzamu, a pediatric hemato-oncologist at Kenyatta National Hospital, has associated the sudden change in handwriting to brain cancer.
She also warned teachers and parents against harassing such children.
It is every parent's wish that their children preform well in school.
Most parents get thrilled once their children start writing well whereas others get disappointed once their children's handwriting becomes poor.
“The child is actually having problem with coordination. They are not even able to walk properly, they are looking lazy, they are sounding like they are clumsy and dropping things all over in the house.
“The reason they are breaking the cups and plates in the house is because they are not able to coordinate and that is a sign of brain cancer,” Nzamu says.
Childhood cancers have been on the rise globally, being diagnosed in 385,509 cases yearly in children aged zero to 19 years.
The medic however said leukemia is the most common type of childhood cancer recorded at the facility.
“Another common one is lymphoma. They are a type of cancer that comes from the lymph nodes and we find children with swelling in the neck, back of the head, around the armpits, in the chest, abdomen and spleen,” Seline Sein, an oncology nurse specialist at KNH said.
According to Childhood Cancer International, when diagnosed early enough and treated with the appropriate protocols, up to 80 per cent of childhood cancers are curable.
However, today only 20 per cent of the world’s children benefit from advanced medical care.
Survivors of childhood cancer may however develop medical and psychosocial effects that severely impact their quality of life hence comprehensive long-term follow-up care is essential.
Nzamu said even though childhood cancer is not really preventable, it is curable, adding that the key is in early diagnosis and trying trying to get it before it spreads.
“If you get it at an early stage and they get the treatments that are available, childhood cancer is totally curable.
"We however get many of our patients when they are late stage three and four. By then the cancer has spread to many organs and we end up losing these patients,” she said.
(Edited by Bilha Makokha)