Techniques of brain cancer treatment

Brain cancer is a very difficult cancer. It is typically
hard to detect and not usually found until some form of
motor skills are affected.  These tumors have the capacity
to grow fast and spread in an aggressive manner, which is
known as metastasis. They grow out of control and push out
normal healthy cells with devastating effects. Brain tumors
are difficult mainly because of the brain tissue they are
around. Other types of cancer are much more easily removed
and can be accessed much easier than going through your
skull and operating around your brain tissue (which can be
easily damaged from the procedure). Data shows that the
incidence of brain cancer due to metastasis is around 25%
of all brain cancers.

Certain symptoms could be indicative of brain cancer. They
are chronic headaches, weakness, difficulty in walking,
seizures, clumsiness in actions, reduced memory or
concentration, nausea and vomiting, vision defects, speech
difficulty and other motor skill difficulties.  Brain
cancer treatment is typically individual-specific. The
physician would take into consider the age and general
health condition of the patient, along with the size, type
and location of the tumor. Brain cancer treatment involves
consultation with several specialists like neurosurgeons,
oncologists, radiologists, dieticians, and
physiotherapists, apart from the primary physician.

Brain cancer treatment is normally done by surgery,
radiation therapy, chemotherapy or a combination of these
three methods. A benign tumor could safely be removed by
surgery. A modern method of surgery, which is a knifeless
technology, is training of high-energy radiation from
different angles on the tumor. The recovery time is much
shorter in this 'gamma knife' surgery. However, before the
surgery is done, the doctor might prescribe a steroid
medication to relieve swelling or an anticonvulsant drug to
prevent or reduce seizures.

Radiation therapy could be of two types, external and
internal. In external therapy, the brain tumor is targeted
with high-energy radiation beams. This treatment is given
for a few minutes for 5 days a week and for 4 to 6 weeks,
depending on the size and type of tumor. Internal radiation
is done by implanting a small radioactive capsule inside
the tumor. This treatment might take several weeks and
would require hospitalization for that period.

Chemotherapy is the administration of a powerful drug or a
combination of such drugs to kill tumor cells. Chemotherapy
is normally done in 2 to 4 cycles of treatment, each cycle
consisting of a short period of intense medication with
enough rest and recovery period after that. However,
chemotherapy is not suitable for most brain cancer
patients, because very few chemotherapies cross the blood
brain barrier so it is useless to give them, and the
stronger the medications the more side effects that will
cause other consequences and effects on the body. .

Even after undergoing brain cancer treatment, regular
follow-up tests and checkups are needed to make sure that
there is no recurrence of brain cancer. The physician would
also watch the long-term effect of the treatment for
corrective action, if needed. The success rate is typically
less than 10%.


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Darren Dunner is the author of this article on brain cancer
treatment. Visit today http://www.facr.org for more
information on the subject.