Cancer Care
Fact sheet

• In 2006, a survey by Child magazine ranked the Oncology Program at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia number one in the nation.
• The Oncology Program at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia is one of the nation’s largest cancer programs for children, and an internationally recognized center for pediatric cancer research and training of future leaders in the field.
• Children’s Hospital’s Oncology Program sees more than 500 new cancer patients each year, and provides evaluation and treatment in more than 16,000 outpatient visits annually.
• The hospital’s oncology unit consists of 40 inpatient oncology and bone marrow transplant beds. There is a dedicated outpatient oncology program at Children’s Hospital’s main campus as well as locations in Lehigh Valley, Pa., King of Prussia, Pa. and Voorhees, NJ.
• Children’s Hospital’s Oncology Program is comprised of an internationally recognized, multidisciplinary staff of physicians, nurses, social workers, child life specialists, psychologists and case managers.
• Children’s Hospital's Oncology Program cares for children from across the United States.
• The Oncology Program at Children’s Hospital is a world leader in classifying and treating neuroblastoma, the most common solid tumor in children, and is at the forefront of developing new therapies to treat pediatric leukemia and solid tumors.
• Children’s Hospital has one of the nation's leading “targeted therapy” programs, developing and testing new agents against childhood leukemias and solid tumors. For example, TRK inhibitors and radioactive MIBG zero in on neuroblastoma cells and spare most normal tissues. The desired goal: treatments that are more effective and less toxic than conventional cancer therapies.
• The Oncology Program at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia has one of the largest pediatric brain tumor programs in the country and treats a large population of children with neurofibromatosis who have peripheral and central nervous system tumors.
• The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia established the first pediatric bone marrow transplantation program in the Delaware Valley.
• Twenty-five years ago, only one in four children with cancer survived. Clinical research and new multidisciplinary protocols, including many developed at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, enable approximately three in four children with cancer today to survive into adulthood.
• Children’s Hospital has pioneered the study of long-term effects of treatment on survivors of childhood cancer and developed the first long-term follow-up program in the nation for childhood cancer survivors. 
• The Oncology Program occasionally treats adults with cancers that may have developed in the patient’s childhood and have been followed since that time by Program’s medical team.
• Pain management is a significant part of the Oncology Program to help children with cancer to mitigate pain caused by the disease. The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia houses a comprehensive Pain Management Program that consists of specially trained physicians, nurses and psychosocial specialists who evaluate and treat chronic and acute pain using medication, visualization, guided imagery and distraction therapy.
• Although the majority of pediatric cancer patients can be cured, Children’s Hospital created a program that helps with the symptom management and psychosocial needs of dying children and their families. Children’s Hospital’s Oncology Program established a multidisciplinary Palliative Care Team to help physicians with the management of patients who are not likely to survive. Besides Oncology, which leads the program, the team includes physicians from critical care, general pediatrics, neurology, pulmonology and neonatology, as well as an advanced-practice nurse, a social worker, a bereavement counselor and psychology support.

For more information
Cardiac Care
Emergency Medicine
Newborn/Infant Care
Orthopaedics
Pulmonology