Childhood Tumors

Tumors are lumps of tissue. They occur when cells divide and multiply rapidly and can occur in many parts of the body. Tumors are divided into benign (benign, non-cancerous) and malignant (malignant, cancer). Benign tumors usually do not spread to other parts of the body other than where they first appeared.

The distribution of childhood cancers in order of frequency is as follows:

• Leukemias (blood cancer): 30%
• Central nervous system tumors (Brain tumors): 19%
• Lymphomas (cancers originating from the lymph node): 13%
• Neuroblastoma (Cancers originating from primitive nerve cells): 8%
• Soft tissue sarcomas (rhabdomyosarcoma is the most common): 7%
• Wilms’ tumor (kidney tumor): 6%
• Bone tumors (Osteosarcoma, Ewing sarcoma): 5%
• Other tumors: 12%

Lymphomas are the second most common disease in our country.