Brain Cancer
Overview of Brain Tumors
A brain tumor is a group of abnormal cells growing in the brain or around it. Tumors can directly destroy healthy brain cells. They can also indirectly damage to invade other parts of the brain and cause inflammation, brain swelling and pressure inside the skull.
Brain tumors can be malignant or benign. A malignant tumor, also called brain cancer often grows rapidly and invades the healthy areas of the brain. Benign tumors do not contain cancer cells. Viewed under a microscope to look normal, usually grow slowly.
Brain tumors can be of two types: primary or metastatic. Primary brain tumors originate in the brain, and appear when metastatic cancer cells elsewhere in the body spread to the brain. For this reason, metastatic brain tumors are almost always malignant, while primary tumors may be benign or malignant. Read the rest of this entry »
Brain Cancer
The exact cause of cancer remains unknown. Is called a primary brain tumor that starts in the brain itself. It can spread to surrounding areas of the brain and destroy them. Breast cancer, lung, skin, or blood cells (leukemia or lymphoma) can also spread (metastasize) to the brain, causing metastatic brain cancer. These groups of cancerous cells may then multiply in a single region or in different parts of the brain.
Symptoms and Complications
Brain cancer causes symptoms when it pushes on the brain that destroys brain tissue. Symptoms depend on the size and location of the tumor, and the speed at which it multiplies. Although headaches are often a symptom of brain cancer, it is important to remember that most headaches are not caused by cancer but are caused by less serious conditions such as migraine or tension. Headaches caused by brain tumors are often severe, associated with nausea and vomiting and often worse early in the day. They can last long or occur intermittently.
Other symptoms include:
* Dizziness
* Impaired vision as double vision
* Impaired coordination
* Weakness or numbness on one side of body
* Seizures
* Changes in mood, senses, personality or feelings
* Impaired memory
* A state of confusion or difficulty concentrating
Types of Brain Tumor Treatment
What is the treatment of brain tumors?
Are used anticonvulsants and corticosteroids as supportive therapy in some patients.
Definitive treatment includes surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy.
In low grade gliomas the recommended treatment is surgery and radiation. We recommend intermediate-dose radiotherapy (50 Gy) and has been shown that the administration of radiation therapy in the postoperative period does not increase the survival of these patients with respect to administered when the disease progresses, but increases the time in which the tumor is controlled.
In high grade gliomas treatment has demonstrated improved survival is the combination of surgery (when feasible), radiation at a dose greater than in low grade gliomas and chemotherapy.
The postoperative treatment component has been shown greater benefit for radiation and for this reason it is recommended to administer an adequate dose (60 Gy) in a confined volume of sophisticated techniques to exclude outside the radiation field the largest proportion of healthy brain tissue avoid toxicity.
This uses various innovative techniques such as three-dimensional radiotherapy formed, radiation therapy with intensity modulation of the beam and stereotactic techniques. They have incorporated new chemotherapeutic drugs that have shown activity (15-30% response) in high-grade tumors such as temozolomide, taxanes, irinotecan.
How to Diagnosis of Brain Tumor?
How is brain tumor diagnosed?
Suspecting a brain tumor, the imaging technique to be recommended is the MRI because it has better anatomic definition than CT and more precisely defines brain tumors.
The definitive diagnosis is made pathologically after resection or biopsy of the tumor. The latter must always be done if the tumor is unresectable or inoperable. It is true that in some cancer sites such as the brainstem biopsy is not recommended for the serious consequences that may result from it.
In cases of lung cancer, especially small cell melanoma and renal tumors is performed MRI to rule out brain metastases before starting the primary tumor treatment by the high probability of spreading to the brain.
There is a known metabolic PET scan (positron emission tomography) that is capable of measuring the behavior of the tumor (more or less aggressive) by the addition of glucose or other labeled molecules. In this diagnostic phase may be useful in directing biopsy to an area of high-grade features, or where biopsy is contraindicated in addition to information provided by brain MRI.
What are known prognostic factors in brain tumors?
The prognosis of patients with brain tumors are inversely correlated with age and histological grade and directly related to the patient’s clinical situation. Some molecular markers have been identified as prognostic factors (eg 1p19q deletion in oligodendrogliomas).
Causes of Brain Tumors
What kind of brain tumors are there?
Brain tumors can be primary tumors or metastatic tumors. Primary tumors originate from the very cells that make up the various brain structures and metastatic tumors are tumors that have spread to the brain from another location extracerebral.
The latter are 10 times more common than primary brain tumors is estimated that about 20-40% of cancer patients develop brain metastases.
Primary brain tumors are highly variable group of tumors with very different origin, prognosis and treatment.
They can range from very rare tumors such as pilocytic astrocytoma curable with surgery alone to glioblastoma multiforme virtually incurable despite treated with surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy.
What primary brain tumors are most common?
The primary tumor is the most common benign meningioma (tumor originated in the brain coverings called meninges). In adults, the most common primary malignant tumors are gliomas or astrocytomas. Gliomas arise from astrocytes or glial cells of the brain that form, together with the vascular network, the support of neurons. In turn, astrocytomas as less aggressive or more are classified as grade I, II, III (anaplastic astrocytoma) and IV (glioblastoma multiforme).
Types of Brain Cancer
Brain Cancer Is the growth of cancer cells in the tissues of the brain can destroy brain cells and also cause damage to cells by inflammation and compression to tumor growth and can cause cerebral edema.
TUMORS
* Astrocytomas: originate in cells called astrocytes that vary in degree of malignancy.
* Oligodendroglial tumors originate in the brain cells oligodendrocytes. Read the rest of this entry »
Brain Cancer
Cancer can occur anywhere in the brain or spinal cord. Cancer cells are abnormal cells that divide too often and without any order.
Workers in oil refining, rubber manufacturing, and drug manufacturing industries have higher rates of certain types of brain tumors.
Symptoms of Brain tumors is symptoms of primary brain tumors and metastatic depend mainly on location in the brain and tumor size. Read the rest of this entry »