| Abstract: |
An increasing number of children and adolescents are surviving childhood cancer diagnoses due to developing treatment modalities, including chemotherapy and radiation. However, survival does not come without its complications, including the risk of infertility. Patients undergoing hematopoietic stem cell transplants, as well as those with metastatic sarcoma diseases, receive higher radiation and chemotherapy doses (alkylating agents in particular), which increase the risk of infertility. Fortunately, fertility preservation options for pre- and post-pubertal males and females are available, including gamete and/or tissue freezing that can be used later in life when the patient reaches childbearing age. Education and guidance about implications of oncology treatments can have on future fertility are often overlooked due to the stress of a new diagnosis, institutional barriers, and personal hesitations or lack of fertility preservation knowledge of the medical provider. New graduate nurses, often at the bedside with patients and families, can be keen advocators for fertility preservation if provided appropriate resources. Research for this article was conducted on PubMed and CINAHL. Search terms included fertility preservation, pediatric oncology, reproductive, cancer patients, and infertility, which produced over 100 articles. Upon narrowing the topic and limiting publication years (within the last 10 years other than five articles), 34 articles were thoroughly reviewed and included. |
