Tulsi Gabbard announced on Friday that she is resigning as President Donald Trump's director of national intelligence following her husband's diagnosis with a rare bone cancer.
"I cannot in good conscience ask him to face this fight alone while I continue in this demanding and time-consuming post," she said.
Her husband, Abraham Williams, who is a cinematographer, photographer and video producer based in Hawaii, was diagnosed with rare bone cancer.
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According to studies, primary bone cancer, or bone sarcomas (that is, cancers that start in the bone), is very rare. It accounts for less than 1 per cent of all cancer diagnoses worldwide.
As per the American Cancer Society, the primary bone cancer accounts for about 0.2 per cent of all cancers, with an incidence rate of roughly 0.9 to 1 case per 100,000 people annually.
What is bone cancer?
Bone cancer is a term that is used for several different cancers that develop in your bones. When cancer cells grow in a bone, they can harm normal bone tissue.
Bone cancers are serious and require prompt treatment.
There are two types of bone cancers: primary bone cancer and metastatic bone cancer (which migrates to the bone from somewhere else).
What are the symptoms of bone cancers?
According to the Cleveland Clinic, some people with bone cancer have no symptoms other than feeling a painless lump. While for others, a variety of symptoms can develop.
Most common symptoms:
*Persistent bone pain (usually worse at night and may feel throbbing, aching or stabbing)
*A lump in the affected area
*Unexplained swelling around the affected area of the bone
*Difficulty moving around
*Fatigue
*Fever
What makes bone cancer different from the rest of the cancers
Most cancers form soft tissue masses that press against organs, while bone cancer grows inside or on a rigid structure. As malignant cells multiply, they alter the natural balance between osteoblasts (cells that build bone) and osteoclasts (cells that break down bone).
The tumour can cause the bone to dissolve (lytic lesions) or become abnormally dense but brittle (blastic lesions). This leads to a unique symptom: pathological fractures, where a bone breaks during normal, everyday movement without any significant trauma.
Also, primary bone cancers are common in children, teens, and young adults. The most common primary bone cancer, osteosarcoma, actively targets the rapidly growing areas near the knees and shoulders of adolescents.
Unlike breast cancer (mammograms) or colon cancer (colonoscopies), there are no routine screening tests for bone cancer. Because early symptoms usually manifest as persistent bone pain or swelling, they are frequently misdiagnosed at first as "growing pains" in teenagers or sports injuries in adults.