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Reasons for Optimism in Combating Aggressive Blood Cancers | The Doctor Weighs In
New medicines, diagnostics, and discoveries give patients more options and more hope.
September is Blood Cancer Awareness Month
As a hematologist-oncologist, the occasion always reminds me to reflect on how far we’ve come in treating blood cancers. And also think about what lies ahead. Blood cancers still have a devastating impact across the United States. However, we have made great progress and there are some big reasons to be optimistic about the future.
Blood cancers may sound like a rare category of diseases, but with more than a million people in the United States now living with, or in remission from, a blood cancer, it is likely that you know someone who has been impacted by the disease.[1]
There are three main types of blood cancer:
The most common is lymphoma, with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, or NHL, being the most common subtype. NHL itself is not one disease, but rather encompasses more than 60 different types of blood cancers that can be either indolent (slow-growing) or aggressive (fast-growing).[2] In these cancers, certain immune cells grow uncontrollably, ultimately leading to improper…
