New Advances That Are Changing Brain Cancer Treatment

Precision medicine is remodelling cancer therapy. Instead of using the same treatment for a similar type of cancer, precision medicine tailors treatment to each individual. Also known as personalized medicine, it takes into consideration the patient’s genes, lifestyle, and environment to determine the most adequate treatment.

But there are many innovative treatments in clinical trials that can enhance and extend the lives of the patients diagnosed with brain tumours. The article will break down the complex terms and medical jargons so that you can understand the new advances in brain cancer treatment.

Avatars

An avatar is a tumour sample that is taken from the patient and grown outside. This allows doctors to study the tumor and treat it with various treatments to see which is the most effective option to eliminate it. Even in its nascent development, tumour avatars are an area of excitement for the future.

Immunotherapy

Immunotherapy utilizes the strength of your immune system to protect itself against cancer. There are a variety of ways to teach the immune system that tumour cells are dangerous and attack them as such:

• Create a vaccine using the patient’s tumour tissue. Taking the immune cells which are part of the brain tumour outside of the body and mixing them to “teach” the immune system to attack the tumour.
• Use viruses as an immunotherapy drug vehicle. A virus is used essentially as a tool to protect the immune system.
• Manipulate the body’s inflammatory response to fight the tumour using checkpoint inhibitors (otherwise known as PDL-1 and PD-1 inhibitors).
• Usage of CAR T-cell therapy. The patient’s white blood cells are labelled with a tumor-specific marker, which then acts as a ‘heat-seeking missile’ to specifically target tumor cells.

5-ALA

5-ALA is a drug that’s taken orally before surgery. It turns those brain tumours that are beyond detection to the naked eye, fluorescent pink under UV light which makes it more visible to the naked eye. When the tumour fluoresces, surgeons can more easily differentiate healthy cells from cancer cells so that they can remove all of the tumour tissue and keep all of the healthy tissue.

Neuro Oncology Treatments

Treatment for neurologic cancers or cancer-related cases includes diagnostic imaging, surgery, stereotactic, conventional radiation therapy, and also chemotherapy. Physicians usually meet once a week to discuss each patient’s condition, determine the best Neuro Oncology Treatments available, and coordinate the ongoing treatment.

Medical Therapy

• Chemotherapy, including both new and standard medications.
• Immunotherapy, a personalized vaccine created with a patient’s own tumor cells to stimulate a tumour-specific response.
• Angiogenesis inhibitors a new drug that mounts a double attack on tumours, halts the growth of unorganized blood vessels before normalizing them, which makes it easier for other therapies to reach their target.
• Targeted therapies are designed to attack exact molecular abnormalities present  in the tumour.

Cancer Surgery

Cancer surgery extracts the tumour and nearby tissue during an operation. A surgical oncologist is a doctor who treats cancer with surgery. Surgery is the primitive type of cancer treatment and it’s still effective for most cancer types known today.

Reasons To Have Surgery

• Cancer surgery helps remove all or some of a cancer
• To find out where the cancer is located
• To find out if cancer has spread already or is affecting the role of other organs in the body
• To restore the body’s appearance or function
• To relieve side effects

Types Of Surgery

For most varieties of cancer, a biopsy is a primary way to treat cancer. During a surgical biopsy, the surgeon cuts, called an incision, into the skin. Then it removes some or all of the suspicious tissue.

There are mainly 2 types of surgical biopsies:

• An incisional biopsy eliminates a piece of the affected area to study.
• An excisional biopsy eliminates the whole affected area, such as a mole or a lump.

Cost of Brain Tumor Treatment In India

Conclusion

Proper information helps the battle with brain tumours less intimidating. Medical sciences are advancing every day and keeping a track of several resources is quite beneficial.