Adolescent and Young Adult Oncology in the United States in 2025: Finding Its Place in the Oncology World-Part 1 of 2

Abstract

In 2015 this core of authors wrote a "state of the union" overview of AYA oncology care at the time titled "Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) Oncology in the United States: A Specialty in Its Late Adolescence." Since then, the landscape of cancer care in this unique population has changed, with encouraging improvement in some areas and persistent challenges in others. Nine years later, we have decided to update our review to demonstrate how far we have come in caring for 15 to 39-year olds with cancer in the United States and how much further we need to go to truly improve both their short-term and long-term outcomes. What started as a call to arms after the AYA-specific Progress Review Group (PRG) in 2006 became a national initiative, which has had successes and failures nationally, regionally, and locally in trying to move the needle for a group of patients that continues to straddle both the pediatric and adult oncology worlds. Back in 2015, we described the field as in its late adolescence, still trying to define itself. With this 2-part review, we hope to demonstrate that as a subspecialty it has grown up but is still trying to firmly establish its place in the larger world of oncology, much like a young adult that has moved away from home and is establishing its own identity in a changing world. In part 1 we focus on epidemiology of AYA cancer as well as acute lymphoblastic leukemia, Hodgkin lymphoma, non-Hodgkin lymphoma, and sarcoma in this unique population of patients.

Keywords: AYA; oncology; pediatrics.