Tumors of the Brain
Treatment for a brain tumor — along with survival odds — depends on the type, size and location of the tumor, as well as your age and overall health. Your doctor will tailor treatment to fit your particular situation.
Because brain tumors can be complex to treat, a team of doctors often treats them. This team may include:
A brain surgeon (neurosurgeon)
A doctor who specializes in treating cancer (oncologist)
A doctor who specializes in reading medical images (radiologist)
A doctor who specializes in radiation therapy (radiation oncologist)
A doctor who specializes in the brain and nervous system (neurologist)
Initial treatment of a brain tumor may include steroid medications to reduce swelling and inflammation of brain tissue. Anticonvulsant medications may help prevent or control seizures.
If the tumor has resulted in a buildup of fluid in your brain (hydrocephalus), your doctor may surgically insert a shunt. A shunt is a long, thin tube that's placed in your brain and then threaded under your skin to another part of your body, usually your abdomen. The tube allows excess fluid to be removed from your brain. These measures aren't often needed for benign, primary brain tumors.
The main treatment methods for brain tumors include:
Surgery. This is the mainstay of brain tumor treatment. It involves removing as much of the tumor as possible while trying to minimize damage to healthy tissue. Some tumors can be removed completely, while others can be removed only partially or not all. If a tumor is slow-growing, doctors may not operate immediately, but take a watch-and-wait approach.
Radiation. High-energy radiation can be used to destroy tumor cells in your brain.
Chemotherapy. These drugs, taken by mouth or intravenously, can help kill cancerous
tumor cells.
Doctors treat many brain tumors with a combination of therapies. Because a tumor may recur if any tumor cells are left behind, the goal is to remove as much, if not all, of the tumor as possible through surgery. Radiation therapy and chemotherapy are used to treat tumors that can't be removed by surgery alone. Brain tumor treatments do carry side effects, such as hair loss and nausea. Ask your doctor about possible side effects and how best to cope with them.
Once treated, a brain tumor may remain in remission for years, or may never recur. When a brain tumor is in remission, it means that tests do not show any signs of the cancer. Sometimes this means the cancer will never return, but in other cases the cancer may be too small for tests to detect, and it may recur at a later date.
As part of follow-up for brain tumor treatment, you'll probably need to be monitored on a regular basis for tumor recurrence with MRI or CT scans. The type of tumor you had determines how often you'll need scans or other tests.
Emerging treatments. Technology is evolving and helping to make the treatment of brain tumors more precise.
Stereotactic localization. This technique utilizes a MRI scan to map a tumor's exact location within the brain. Techniques using lasers and ultrasound also make removal of the tumor more precise, reducing the risk that cancer cells will be left behind and that healthy tissue will be harmed.
Stereotactic radiosurgery. This treatment precisely focuses radiation beams to a tumor. No scalpels are involved. Gamma knife stereotactic radiosurgery delivers radiation beams in the exact size and shape of the tumor, with the aid of brain-imaging techniques.
Drug-delivering implants. This option is for tumors less than 3 cm in diameter. Researchers are also studying new ways to deliver cancer-fighting drugs to brain tumors. For instance, biodegradable wafers containing cancer-fighting drugs are being implanted in some tumors during surgery.
Other approaches. Gene therapy, drugs that cut off a tumor's blood supply and agents that may be able to interrupt tumor growth or to seek out and kill brain cancer cells are all under investigation.
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