Nutrition and Health During and After Childhood Cancer

Dear Colleagues,

While the cure rate for pediatric cancer now exceeds 80%, more than 60% of childhood cancer survivors will develop a chronic health condition in the long term, years after the end of treatment. These long-term side effects include a greater risk of heart disease, metabolic syndrome, dyslipidemia, and hypertension, as well as a lower cardiorespiratory fitness level. Since inactivity and unhealthy food habits contribute to health complications in this population, nutritional interventions during and after treatment could help prevent these problems. In addition to the impact on long-term health, children and adolescents will most likely suffer from debilitating side effects during the course of treatments. Many of these side effects involve the gastrointestinal system and can result in weight loss and malnutrition, poor clinical outcomes, and lesser tolerance to treatments and may significantly harm patients’ prognosis due to dose reductions and treatment interruptions. What is less known is that cancer treatments can also, in the acute phase, negatively impact the child’s cardiometabolic health, leading to obesity, dyslipidemia, hypertension, and insulin resistance. Given the unequivocal importance of diet in cardiometabolic health, nutritional aspects during and after cancer treatment need to be better addressed. As part of the following Topic, entitled “Nutrition and Health During and After Childhood Cancer’, we aim to address several topics related to nutrition during and after pediatric cancer including, but not limited to, the impact of weight and diet on response to treatment and malnutrition, the impact of treatments on food intake and behaviors, nutritional interventions, and diet in survivors of childhood cancer, and the impact of nutrition on cardiometabolic health during and after childhood cancer treatment.

Prof. Dr. Valérie Marcil
Prof. Dr. Joya Chandra
Topic Editors