Treatment abandonment
Treatment abandonment includes failure to start treatment or treatment dropout. Treatment dropout is defined as treatment discontinuation for at least four weeks consecutively [12]. Of the 169 cancer cases requiring chemotherapy, 148 (88%) initiated chemotherapy. However, among those that started chemotherapy, 28 did not complete the required number of sessions, corresponding to a treatment dropout rate of 19%. In total, about 30% of patients with pediatric cancer, who were eligible for chemotherapy, abandoned their treatment. Figure 2 illustrates the pediatric chemotherapy cascade for the two hospitals.