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Treatment for childhood brain and spinal cord tumors can last for weeks or months. At the Stephen D. Hassenfeld Children’s Center for Cancer and Blood Disorders, part of Hassenfeld Children’s Hospital at NYU Langone, our doctors, nurses, physical therapists, child life specialists, and social workers help support your family’s needs throughout diagnosis, treatment, and beyond.
Rehabilitation after chemotherapy, radiation, or surgery can be an important part of your child’s treatment. The rehabilitation doctors at NYU Langone’s nationally renowned Rusk Rehabilitation can prescribe occupational therapy, which helps children perform everyday activities. They can also prescribe physical therapy, pain management, psychological therapy, and speech therapy for post-treatment muscle weakness, balance and coordination problems, speech issues, and growth problems.
The Stephen D. Hassenfeld Children’s Center for Cancer and Blood Disorders offers wellness programs for children with brain and spinal cord tumors and their families. Programs include art, massage, and music therapies, as well as psychological services, sibling support groups, and teen and young adult support groups. Our social workers, therapists, and medical librarians are on hand to provide additional information about treatments and wellness.
Our child and family support services and resilience programs are provided by Sala Institute for Child and Family Centered Care.
Treatment for certain types of brain and spinal cord tumors can cause infertility in men and women. Our specialists at NYU Langone’s Fertility Center and NYU Langone Reproductive Specialists of New York can explain your child’s options for banking sperm or freezing eggs prior to treatment. These procedures are typically limited to children who have entered puberty, when girls produce mature eggs and boys begin to produce sperm.
New targeted chemotherapy drugs that kill cancer cells in brain and spinal cord tumors while sparing healthy cells are under investigation. For some children, an experimental treatment being tested in a clinical research trial may provide additional options.
NYU Langone is a member of the Children’s Oncology Group, a National Cancer Institute–supported organization that unites thousands of experts worldwide. This membership enables our doctors to offer and operate clinical trials, scientific studies designed to test new and emerging treatments for cancer and other conditions. Your doctor can help you decide if participating in a clinical trial is right for your child.