A new study has found that chemotherapy radiation treatment could add years to the lives of those suffering from slow-generating brain tumors following an extensive trial initiated in 1998, according to a UPI report. All subjects were diagnosed with 2 gliomas, tumors that began to slowly grow in certain brain cells called glial cells.
Initial results had shown the adding chemotherapy to standard treatment amounts regardless of surgery deterred the progression of tumors. There’s now evidence that it can prolong lives as well. “Until now, there hasn’t been any therapy known to improve life expectancy for these patients,” said lead researcher Dr. Jan Buckner and chair of oncology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.
The U.S. National Cancer Institute (NCI) has recorded roughly 23,000 adults diagnosed with brain cancer in 2015. Various forms exist, and grade 2 gliomas are considered rare attributable to 5 to 10% of all brain cancers researchers noted. They’re slower growing as well, as “grades” refer to the growth’s aggressiveness; grades 3 and 4 generate at faster rates.
The lastest survey, published in the April 7th issue of the New England of Medicine, recruited 251 patients between 1998 and 2002. Half of subjects were designated for radiation therapy alone while the other half was assigned chemo after various drug treatments such as procarbazine, CCNU, and vincristine. When feasible, some participants had a portion of the cancer surgically removed before radiation was applied.
At the conclusion of the study, 55 percent of patients had died; those who were given chemo survived longer, typically 13 years, opposed to eight years among subjects who’d only been given radiation.”An extra five years,” Buckner said. “That’s a significant difference.”
And Dr. Susan Chang, director of neuro-oncology at the University of California San Francisco Medical Center, voiced support: “We should celebrate that we have a treatment that can prolong these patients’ lives,” she said,”But at the same time,” she added, “we have to recognize that there’s a need for less toxic treatments.”