SURVIVAL OF childhood cancer in Ireland is not linked to social or economic background or distance from treatment, according to a study published this week.
While there is evidence from European research that adult cancer survival is influenced by region or deprivation, this does not seem to true for child cancers.
“This finding may be a result of the greater standardisation and centralisation of cancer treatment in Ireland for children compared to adults,” said lead author Dr Paul Walsh, epidemiologist at the National Cancer Registry.
Researchers from the registry, the Boyne Research Institute in Drogheda and Our Lady’s hospital, Crumlin considered the three main types of childhood cancer: leukaemia, lymphoma and central nervous system tumours.
They used data on 1,440 children diagnosed from 1994-2005 and investigated whether the region of Ireland or level of deprivation where they lived affected survival. No difference in childhood cancer survival was found between any of the four areas of Ireland, according to the research, published in the current edition of the European Journal of Cancer.
Survival of one cancer subtype did show a weak regional effect. Children with central nervous system cancers had a slightly higher chance if they lived in the west. This finding could not easily be explained, the authors said.
Dr Walsh said that children from all backgrounds had “as good a chance of survival” as “what we would have hoped to see”.