Medical Treatment Options

The types of treatment used most often to treat childhood cancer are surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and bone marrow transplantation. The goal of treatment is to destroy the cancer cells. Your child may have one kind of treatment or a combination of treatments and they may have to have a variety of tests and procedures during treatment. Their treatment plan depends on the type of cancer, stage of disease and many other factors. Before treatment starts, your doctor will discuss the treatment plan with you including expected benefits, risks and side effects. Nationwide Children's also participates in clinical trials.

The Blood and Cancer Center at Nationwide Children's Hospital is one of the largest pediatric cancer centers in the country and a member of the Children’s Oncology Group (COG), which ensures that your child will get the highest quality care available anywhere in the country. Our program is uniquely family-centered, with patients benefiting from a multi-disciplinary clinical team and state-of-the-art facility.

  • Chemotherapy is the treatment of cancer with “anti-cancer” drugs to destroy cancer cells throughout the body. Chemotherapy drugs slow or stop cancer cells from growing and making more abnormal cells. These drugs also may affect normal healthy cells, but healthy cells can repair and return to normal.

  • Radiation Therapy is the treatment of cancer and other diseases with high-energy rays to damage or destroy cancer cells. Radiation damages or destroys the cells in the area being treated making it impossible for the cancers cells to continue to grow and multiply. Most radiotherapy is delivered from the outside of the body (external beam radiotherapy) usually in the form of high energy X-rays. Radiation therapy can damage normal cells as well as cancer cells. When this happens, side effects occur. If your child is receiving radiation therapy, you will receive more information from your doctors and nurses.

  • A Bone Marrow Transplant (BMT) replaces diseased bone marrow with healthy bone marrow. Bone marrow is the soft material inside the bones of the body that makes blood cells.  In an autologous bone marrow transplant, the patient’s own bone marrow is treated and reinfused (put back into the patient). In an allogenic bone marrow transplant, healthy marrow comes from a donor.

Learn more about surgical treatment options.

Clinical Trials

You or your child may be asked to participate in a clinical trial. Your participation in this research study is voluntary.

A clinical trial is a research study in which physicians find ways to improve cancer treatment. The goals of these studies are to answer scientific questions about preventing, diagnosing and treating cancer.

A clinical trial for cancer treatment occurs in three phases.

  • Phase I – This is a first study done on a drug to test its safeness, to determine the right dose, and to determine when and how to give the drug. These studies usually are limited to a small number of patients.

  • Phase II – As in Phase I, this phase also tests the safety of a drug, but the trial also tests how well the drug works to treat different types of cancers.

  • Phase III – This phase of a clinical trial studies various drugs, usually in combination, against standard therapy. These studies enroll large numbers of patients at many different cancer centers.

Cancer treatment has improved greatly over the past several decades due to the use of clinical trials. Children’s Hospital does Phase I, Phase II and Phase III clinical trials. If you are asked to participate in a clinical trial, the physician will review the study and consent form with you and answer your questions. You will receive a pamphlet with more detailed information about clinical trials to help you make a decision.

Tests and Procedures

Depending on your child’s diagnosis, he or she may need to have tests or procedures done periodically through their treatment. These may be done to see how your child is responding to treatment or to keep a watch on side effects.

Click on the links below to learn more about specific tests and procedures:

Treatment Outcomes

Nationwide Children's Hospital has the largest and most advanced pediatric cancer program in Ohio – and one of the largest in the nation. In 2004, more than 1,000 children were treated at Nationwide Children's – the highest number of pediatric oncology inpatient visits in the state. More than 75 percent of children who receive a diagnosis of cancer in 2005 will be cancer-free five years later, but much work remains to be done to find cures for cancers for which there is no effective pro-tocol. Nationwide Children's Research Institute ranks in the top 10 of free-standing pediatric research centers based on National Institutes of Health funding.

Learn more about pediatric cancer research.