February is National Cancer Prevention Month, and it’s easy to participate by learning about cancer prevention and helping to inform others about diet, lifestyle, and other factors that may contribute to cancer. Many lifestyle choices and risk factors can affect your cancer risk, and Cancer Prevention Month is a time to remind people that cancer can happen to anyone at any time throughout their lives. 

September Is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. Learn the facts on how you can help kids with cancer this September. 

Today is Family Health And Fitness Day. Park your car and have some fitness fun with your family! In today’s world we can get from point A to point B within a few minutes, without even thinking of walking or riding a bike to places. Here are some great activities to enjoy with the family: […]

Make-A-Wish Missouri is bringing the first Bubble Ball to Kansas City, MO. to benefit local kids facing critical illnesses. This signature evening wish event will feature live music, wish kids, cocktails, hors d’oeuvres and much more! Plus, the main event is an art gallery and runway show created by local companies featuring bubble wrap! To […]

If you are having a hard time trying to find the best way to get your steps in, there is a fun and charitable way to get your steps in. Make-A-Wish Sand Diego has three events coming up to get you up and moving: Walk For Wishes 4/22, Amazing Race For Children’s Wishes 5/7, and the Trailblaze Challenge 5/19-5/21.

August is National Immunization Month. This is a great time to talk with your doctor and make sure that you’re up to date with your immunizations. The thought of getting shots can be freighting. However, when you learn about the life-threating diseases that can happen without them, that small prick doesn’t seem so bad. There are four categories that you or your children might fall in to, birth to age six, preteens and teens, adult, and pregnant woman. Each of these four categories has different recommended immunizations.

A lot of negativity tends to surround the word "cancer," but National Cancer Survivors Day (NCSD) offers a more positive message. June 5, 2016 is set aside as the day to celebrate survivors, inspire those who were recently diagnosed, support families and bring the community together.

During the month of July, it is Bladder and Gastrointestinal Cancer Awareness Month. There are fewer than 200,000 cases of bladder cancer per year in the U.S. Bladder cancer also has a low mortality rate because it is usually caught in the early stages. Gastrointestinal cancer involves many organs within the digestive tract including the esophagus, gallbladder, liver, pancreas stomach, small intestines, bowel (large intestines and rectum) and anus. This cancer involves a large area of the body, making this one of the most common types of cancers. Gastrointestinal Cancer involves many organs making it difficult to detect, and, because of that, it has a high mortality rate.

May is Cancer Research Month, and it's a great time to learn more about the lifesaving advances that researchers have made over the years. Cancer research is a major field of study, and new discoveries are made on a daily basis. Our understanding of cancer has grown immensely over the past few decades. In honor of Cancer Research Month, here are a few interesting facts you may not have known about cancer research. 

April is the awareness month for four types of cancer: head and neck, esophageal, and testicular. It’s an important time to discuss these different diseases because some can be prevented through self-care, while others need to be discovered during examination by a doctor. Many of these cancers are related because of the three ways that the disease spreads throughout the body:

• Tissue. Cancer cells can spread from where they began by developing into nearby regions.
• Lymph system. When cancer gets into the lymph system, it spreads through the lymph vessels to other parts of the body.
• Blood. If cancer gets into the blood, it travels through the blood vessels to other areas.

Cancer awareness months are not meant to cause worry or hypochondria. The purpose of this month is to spread awareness about these diseases, many of which are preventable through lifestyle choices and are also highly treatable. 

Spring is in the air in much of the country, and kids who have spent months bundled up during the winter are ready to get outside and play. For many kids, that means riding their bikes, scooters, or skateboards with friends through the neighborhood.

March is Brain Injury Awareness Month, and helping keep children safe from head injuries is very important. A traumatic brain injury (TBI) occurs when someone's head is hit by something or shaken violently. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 1.7 million people receive TBIs each year. Of children up to 19 years old, TBI results in 631,146 trips to the emergency room each year.

Brain injuries, including concussions, can occur to kids while biking, during sports games or even on a playground if they were to fall while playing and hit their head. As a parent, before you let your kids go out biking, you need make sure that their helmet from last season still fits properly. If you have to buy a new helmet, make sure it fits snug. Buying a larger size that they can grow into can lead to disastrous consequences if they fall and hit their head. If the helmet doesn't fit properly, it won't protect as it should in the event of a fall.

What Symptoms Should Parents Look For?

According to Parent Center Hub, the term traumatic brain injury is used to describe trauma to the head that can cause permanent changes to areas of their mental cognition such as:

• Thinking and reasoning
• Understanding certain words or parts of language.
•  Short-term memory loss
• Paying attention
• Problem-solving
• Thinking abstractly
•  Speech and other communication skills
• Behavioral patterns
• Walking or other physical activities
• The ability to learn new things, especially if a skill was never introduced to the child before trauma.

According to the Brain Injury Association of America, there are some essential ways to protect your children’s safety and significantly reduces the risk of brain injury. make sure your children (and you), stay safe from brain injuries:

• Wear a seat belt every time riding in a motor vehicle.
• Buckle children in the car using a child safety seat, booster seat, or seat belt according to the child’s height, weight and age. Children should start using a booster seat when they outgrow their child safety seats. Children should continue to ride in a booster seat until the lap/shoulder belts in the car fit properly, typically when they are approximately 4-foot-9 tall. Local police or fire departments often have clinics for parents to help make sure child safety seats are properly installed.
• Wear a helmet and make sure children wear helmets that are fitted properly. Specialty bike shops generally have staff member who are great at fitting helmets. The right helmets can reduce the risk of severe brain injuries by 88 percent, according to SafeKids.org.
• Make sure playground surfaces are made of shock-absorbing materials, such as hardwood mulch or sand, and are maintained to an appropriate depth.
• Use the right protective equipment and make sure it is maintained properly.

Help Local Children’s Charities

Each year, many children are affected by serious or chronic (?) medical condition. Vehicle donations help to provide these children with better lives. Donate a car, truck, motorcycle, boat, or camper and let Wheels For Wishes turn your vehicle into hope and encouragement for a child in your community.

When you donate a vehicle to Wheels For Wishes, your donation will go towards supporting the children’s charities in your area. See which charity your donation will benefit by checking out our Chapter Locator. When you donate a car, truck, boat, or motorcycle to Wheels For Wishes, you will receive free pick up or towing of your vehicle. To make a car donation, simply call [chapter_phone] or make your donation online.

Help to support children’s charities by donating your vehicle to Wheels For Wishes.

Spring is in the air in much of the country, and kids who have spent months bundled up during the winter are ready to get outside and play. For many kids, that means riding their bikes, scooters, or skateboards with friends through the neighborhood.

March is Brain Injury Awareness Month, and helping keep children safe from head injuries is very important. A traumatic brain injury (TBI) occurs when someone's head is hit by something or shaken violently. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 1.7 million people receive TBIs each year. Of children up to 19 years old, TBI results in 631,146 trips to the emergency room each year.

Brain injuries, including concussions, can occur to kids while biking, during sports games or even on a playground if they were to fall while playing and hit their head. As a parent, before you let your kids go out biking, you need make sure that their helmet from last season still fits properly. If you have to buy a new helmet, make sure it fits snug. Buying a larger size that they can grow into can lead to disastrous consequences if they fall and hit their head. If the helmet doesn't fit properly, it won't protect as it should in the event of a fall.

What Symptoms Should Parents Look For?

According to Parent Center Hub, the term traumatic brain injury is used to describe trauma to the head that can cause permanent changes to areas of their mental cognition such as:

• Thinking and reasoning
• Understanding certain words or parts of language.
•  Short-term memory loss
• Paying attention
• Problem-solving
• Thinking abstractly
•  Speech and other communication skills
• Behavioral patterns
• Walking or other physical activities
• The ability to learn new things, especially if a skill was never introduced to the child before trauma.

According to the Brain Injury Association of America, there are some essential ways to protect your children’s safety and significantly reduces the risk of brain injury. make sure your children (and you), stay safe from brain injuries:

• Wear a seat belt every time riding in a motor vehicle.
• Buckle children in the car using a child safety seat, booster seat, or seat belt according to the child’s height, weight and age. Children should start using a booster seat when they outgrow their child safety seats. Children should continue to ride in a booster seat until the lap/shoulder belts in the car fit properly, typically when they are approximately 4-foot-9 tall. Local police or fire departments often have clinics for parents to help make sure child safety seats are properly installed.
• Wear a helmet and make sure children wear helmets that are fitted properly. Specialty bike shops generally have staff member who are great at fitting helmets. The right helmets can reduce the risk of severe brain injuries by 88 percent, according to SafeKids.org.
• Make sure playground surfaces are made of shock-absorbing materials, such as hardwood mulch or sand, and are maintained to an appropriate depth.
• Use the right protective equipment and make sure it is maintained properly.

Help Local Children’s Charities

Each year, many children are affected by serious or chronic (?) medical condition. Vehicle donations help to provide these children with better lives. Donate a car, truck, motorcycle, boat, or camper and let Wheels For Wishes turn your vehicle into hope and encouragement for a child in your community.

When you donate a vehicle to Wheels For Wishes, your donation will go towards supporting the children’s charities in your area. See which charity your donation will benefit by checking out our Chapter Locator. When you donate a car, truck, boat, or motorcycle to Wheels For Wishes, you will receive free pick up or towing of your vehicle. To make a car donation, simply call [chapter_phone] or make your donation online.

Help to support children’s charities by donating your vehicle to Wheels For Wishes.

Each year, nearly 13,000 cases of cervical cancer are diagnosed in the U.S. This disease was once one of the leading causes of cancer death among women, but the death rate has dropped more than 50 percent over the last 30 years.

Birth defects are structural changes that can be detected before birth, at birth, or any time after birth. They can affect almost any part of the body, such as the heart, foot, or brain. Birth defects are common, and according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), birth defects affect 1 in every 33 babies born in the United States each year. January is National Birth Defects Prevention Month, and you can help to reduce your child’s risk of developing a birth defect by making healthy choices during pregnancy. 

In addition to learning more about lung, pancreatic and stomach cancer this month, November is also a great time to learn more about carcinoid tumors and other neuroendocrine tumors. If you don't know much about these tumors, Carcinoid Tumor Awareness Month and Neuroendocrine Tumor Awareness Day can be a great opportunity. 

With all the attention that Breast Cancer Awareness Month gets during October, it's easy to forget about the awareness campaigns that follow in November. This month, you're encouraged to help raise awareness for lung cancer, pancreatic cancer, stomach cancer, and carcinoid cancer.

Most people are aware that October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, but it is also Liver Cancer Awareness Month. Liver cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death worldwide. While it rarely affects children, awareness campaigns like Liver Cancer Awareness Month can be a great opportunity to teach children more about the healthy choices that can reduce their future cancer risk. Since it is possible for children to develop liver cancer, October is also an important time to learn more about the signs and symptoms of liver cancer in children.

October is a great time to help raise awareness and support breast cancer research, but you may not know that it's also Liver Cancer Awareness Month. Liver cancer is rare in children, but it is possible. Awareness months like Liver Cancer Awareness Month can also be a great time to learn more about the healthy choices you can make in your children's lives that will impact their future health and cancer risk.

Child Health Day has been around for quite some time. The federal holiday was introduced to Congress in 1928 and was celebrated for the first time in May 1929. Now it falls on the first Monday of each October, which is Oct. 5 this year.

Last year, more than 156,000 people in the United States were expected to be diagnosed with a blood cancer such as leukemia or lymphoma. That works out to one new diagnoses every 4 minutes. New cases of leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma was expected to account for 9.4 percent of the estimated 1,665,540 new cancer cases diagnosed in the country last year.

Every September, Leukemia, Lymphoma and Hodgkin's Lymphoma Awareness Months helps raise awareness about these types of blood cancer and to give hope to those affected by the disease. Leukemia, Hodgkin lymphoma, non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), myeloma and myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) are types of cancer that can affect the bone marrow, the blood cells, the lymph nodes and other parts of the lymphatic system. Learn about which color ribbon to wear this month, as well as other color ribbons associated with each cancer awareness month ribbon.

Improvements in the treatment of these types of blood cancers began during the latter part of the 20^th century largely due to chemotherapy. Research has led to the growing understanding of the many subtypes for each of the blood cancers, and the differences in therapy required based on subtype.

What Is Lymphoma?

Lymphoma is a general term for many blood cancers that originate in the lymphatic system. The two main types are Hodgkin lymphoma and non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Some types of lymphoma are curable, but for other types, many patients are able to keep their disease under control and have a good quality of life with medical treatment. Progress in treating lymphoma gives patients more hope than ever before.

What Is Leukemia?

Leukemia is a type of cancer that affects the blood and bone marrow, the spongy center of bones where our blood cells are formed. The disease develops when blood cells produced in the bone marrow grow out of control. The most common types are acute myeloid leukemia, acute lymphoblastic leukemia, chronic myeloid leukemia, and chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Other types of leukemia include hairy cell leukemia, chronic myelomonocytic leukemia and juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia.

Children Affected By These Diseases, Too

Leukemia affects approximately 10 times more adults than children, according to the National Cancer Institute, but it is the most common cancer among children, with acute lymphoblastic leukemia accounting for approximately 75 percent of all childhood leukemias.

The two types of childhood Hodgkin lymphoma are: Hodgkin lymphoma and non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Hodgkin lymphoma is cancer of the blood and bone marrow, and is one of the most curable forms of cancer. Signs and symptoms could include:

• Swollen lymph nodes in the neck, upper chest, armpit, stomach, or groin
• A persistent cough or shortness of breath
• Fever
• Night sweats
• Tiredness, low energy
• Unexplained weight loss
• Itchy skin
• An enlarged spleen

Non-Hodgkin lymphoma is a diverse group of blood cancers that share a single characteristic in how they develop. It usually develops in the lymph nodes and lymphatic tissues, but sometimes involves bone marrow and blood.

Help To Spread Awareness This Month

Other types of blood cancers include myeloma, myelodysplastic syndromes, and myeloproliferative neoplasms. Most people who are diagnosed with myeloma are over the age of 60. This type of cancer begins in the bone marrow and affects the plasma cells.

Myelodysplastic syndromes is a term used to describe a group of diseases in the blood and bone marrow. No symptoms other than fatigue or shortness of breath may occur, and may be diagnosed due to a routine exam or blood test. 

Myeloproliferative neoplasms are types of blood cancers that begin with an abnormal mutation in a stem cell in the bone marrow. This change leads to an overproduction of white cells, red cells, and platelets.

With this information, you can help to understand the people who are battling these diseases, and you can also help to spread awareness.

Donate A Car To Grant Wishes For Children With Medical Conditions Like These

Survival rates for childhood cancers are continuing to grow, but amongst all of the hospital visits, appointments, treatments, and surgeries, children battling critical illnesses have wishes that they would love to see come true. Wishes could include a family vacation, a shopping trip, or a chance to meet their favorite sports team.  

Thanks to Make-A-Wish, a child between the age of 2 ½ and 18 has their wish granted every 38 minutes, and your car donation to Wheels For Wishes can help to make this possible! Donate a car today and receive a tax deduction for your charitable contribution, plus you will feel great knowing that your donated car has helped to make a wish come true for a local child. Call [chapter_phone] or fill out an online car donation form today.

This July, you can make a difference by helping to raise awareness about sarcoma, including its symptoms and risk factors. Sarcoma is a cancer that affects the connective tissues in the body. Approximately 1 percent of adult cancers and 15 to 20 percent of childhood cancers are sarcomas of the bones or soft tissues. Sarcoma is relatively rare, accounting for an estimated 12,000 cases of cancer in 2015. That's why Sarcoma Awareness Month can be the perfect opportunity to learn more about sarcoma and share what you learn with friends and family who might not be aware.