The number of cancer survivors in the U.S. will approach 18 million, up 31% from about 13.7 million as of Jan. 1, 2012, according to Julia Rowland, PhD, of the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Md., and colleagues.
The increase in the number of survivors will be due primarily to an aging of the population. By 2020, we expect that two-thirds of cancer survivors are going to be age 65 or older, says Julia Rowland of the National Cancer Institute, which conducted the study.
How to ensure that these patients lead not only long lives, but healthy and productive lives, will be a vital challenge to all of us, said Julia Rowland, the director of the Office of Cancer Survivorship at the National Cancer Institute in a statement.
"Unfortunately for many cancer survivors and those around them, the effect of cancer does not end with the last treatment," said Julia Rowland, director of the Office of Cancer Survivorship at the National Cancer Institute, a part of the