Cancer

Chemotherapy
Chemotherapy is medicine used by cancer doctors to shrink and cure cancerous tumours or to rid the body of cancerous leukaemia cells. Some types of chemotherapy can make hair fall out and cause children to feel sick and vomit. The vomiting can be treated with medicine and the hair grows back after the chemotherapy treatment stops.

Radiotherapy
Radiotherapy is done in the radiotherapy department at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham. You have to lie very still for radiotherapy so young children will need to have an anaesthetic for the procedure. Usually a course of chemotherapy is required with many trips to have treatment. Radiotherapy helps shrink certain types of cancer and is often used alongside chemotherapy to treat certain types of cancer.

Cancer surgery
Sometimes the best way to treat cancer is to have an operation to remove the tumour. This might be a brain tumour or a tumour elsewhere in the body. Many children need chemotherapy or radiotherapy to improve the chance that the treatment will work and get rid of all of the cancer.