People who survive cancer during childhood and early adulthood are more likely to experience severe, life-threatening health problems later on in life.

在童年和成年早期战胜癌症的人更有可能在以后的生活中经历严重的、危及生命的健康问题。

In fact, many of the survivors die before other people the same age.

事实上，许多幸存者的寿命没有其他同龄人长。

Those are findings from a recent study.

这是最近一项研究的结果。

A report on the study was published this month in The Lancet Oncology.

这项研究的报告本月发表在《柳叶刀肿瘤学》杂志上。

Researchers followed almost 12,000 young cancer survivors and about 5,000 of their siblings for about 20 years.

研究人员对近12000名年轻癌症幸存者和大约5000名同龄人进行了20年的跟踪调查。

All of these relatives were said to be in good health.

据说所有这些同龄人都身体健康。

The cancer survivors were free of the disease for at least five years at the start of the study.

在这项研究开始的时候，癌症幸存者至少有五年没有患上这种疾病。

Yet they were still about six times more likely to die during the follow-up period than their siblings.

然而，他们在随访期间死亡的可能性仍然比他们的同龄人高出大约六倍。

Tara Henderson was the lead writer of the report.

塔拉·亨德森是这份报告的主要作者。

She noted, "Before 1960, cancer before the age of 21 years was uniformly fatal,

她指出，“1960年以前，21岁之前患的癌症都是致命的，

and currently about 83% of anyone diagnosed with cancer before the age of 21 years can be cured."

目前，在21岁之前被诊断出患有癌症的人中，约有83%可以治愈。“

Henderson is director of cancer survivorship at the University of Chicago's Comprehensive Cancer Center.

亨德森是芝加哥大学综合癌症中心癌症幸存者项目的主任。

She said that doctors need to put more effort into learning the long-term side effects of cancer treatment.

她说，医生需要花更多的精力来了解癌症治疗的长期副作用。

The Reuters news agency reported her comments.

路透社报道了她的评论。

Better survival chances also mean children may have a higher risk of developing health problems as a result of tumors or cancer treatments.

更好的生存机会也意味着，由于肿瘤或癌症治疗，儿童患上健康问题的风险可能更高。

The problems include heart disease, old cancers returning or possible new cancers.

这些问题包括心脏病、旧病复发或可能的新癌症。

Many doctors turn to chemotherapy to treat cancer patients.

许多医生利用化疗来治疗癌症患者。

They use drugs to stop the growth of cancer cells, either by killing the cells or by stopping them from dividing.

他们用药物来阻止癌细胞的生长，要么杀死细胞要么阻止细胞分裂。

Yet chemotherapy can weaken the heart muscle and some newer targeted medicines increase the risk of heart failure.

然而化疗会削弱心肌，一些新的靶向药物会增加心力衰竭的风险。

So says the American Heart Association.

美国心脏协会如是说。

The group also notes that radiation can cause heart rhythm disorders and structural damage in blood vessels and heart valves.

美国心脏协会还指出，辐射可能导致心律失常和血管和心脏瓣膜的结构损伤。

By age 45, 56 percent of the childhood cancer survivors diagnosed with the disease before age 15 had developed severe health problems.

到45岁时，在15岁之前被诊断患有癌症的儿童幸存者中，有56%出现了严重的健康问题。

That compares with 39 percent of survivors diagnosed while growing up or in early adulthood and 12 percent of siblings without any history of cancer.

相比之下，39%的幸存者在成长或成年早期被诊断出患有癌症，12%的同龄人没有癌症病史。

Death rates were also higher for cancer survivors diagnosed during childhood than for those diagnosed during adolescence or early adulthood.

在儿童时期确诊的癌症幸存者的死亡率，也高于在青春期或成年早期确诊的癌症幸存者。

However, survivors of childhood cancer were less likely to die from returning tumors than survivors who were diagnosed a little later.

然而，儿童癌症幸存者死于复发肿瘤的可能性要比被诊断为晚一点的幸存者要低。

Researchers followed people diagnosed with cancer between 1970 and 1999.

研究人员跟踪了1970到1999年间被诊断患有癌症的人。

They found that it is possible that long-term results might be better for people diagnosed today because of better treatments.

他们发现，由于更好的治疗方法，对于今天被诊断出的人来说，长期的结果可能会更好。

The researchers said that is partly because of changes designed to improve survival chances and decrease the risk of severe treatment-related health problems.

研究人员说，部分原因是为了提高生存机会和降低与治疗相关的严重健康问题的风险而做出的改变。

One limitation of the study is that researchers lacked information on three kinds of cancer:

这项研究的一个局限是，研究人员缺乏关于三种癌症的信息:

tumors in the gonads, thyroid, and skin.

生殖腺肿瘤、甲状腺肿瘤和皮肤肿瘤。

Those three make up about 40 percent of cancers discovered in 15-to 20-year-olds.

这三种癌症在15- 20岁的患癌人中占40%。

Päivi Lähteenmäki is a doctor with Turku University in Finland and the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden.

派维·拉缇马基是芬兰图尔库大学和瑞典斯德哥尔摩卡罗林斯卡学院的一名医生。

She noted that,

她指出，

"Some cancer-related complications do not become apparent until several years following cancer treatment."

“一些癌症相关的并发症直到癌症治疗后几年才变得明显。”

In an email to Reuters,

在给路透社的电子邮件中，

she urged cancer patients to "adopt a healthy lifestyle to help make severe or life-threatening medical issues less likely to develop."

她敦促癌症患者“采用健康的生活方式，以帮助减少严重或危及生命的医疗问题的发生。”

She added that patients can do a number of things, including exercising, eating well,

她补充说，病人可以做很多事情，包括锻炼，吃得好，

not smoking and keeping a healthy body weight.

不吸烟，保持健康体重。

I'm Jonathan Evans.

乔纳森·埃文斯为您播报。