Why the brain is a difficlut frontier to treat

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Olga had posted some really good medical articles pretaining to treatment of brain tumors that may present themselves as either inoperatable or persistant in reappearing after various efforts to treat them.
As I understand it the brain presents quite a challenge to treat, however I do not believe the tumors to be impossible combat.

http://www.cureasps.org/forum/viewtopic ... =165#p6339

The articles that Olga posted are from the personal section of Kevin and Connis, but I have copied and placed them below as well.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22323823

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12125975

The link below describes how incrediablely designed the brain is.
The blood-brain barrier allows the passage of water, some gases, and lipid soluble molecules by passive diffusion, as well as the selective transport of molecules such as glucose and amino acids that are crucial to neural function. . And because of its design which includes a barrier that selects what it allows in, alot of chemos are not able to cross that barrier.

A small number of regions in the brain, including the circumventricular organs (CVOs), do not have a blood-brain barrier.


The wikipedia also goes into discussion on nano technology being researched to create a medicine by way of liposomes to combat brain cancers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood%E2%8 ... in_barrier

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Was reading a neuro article and it suggested that ultrasounds were being experimentally used to aid in opening up the
BBB so as aid in treating brain tumors with non BBB drugs


Found the following article -

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/24 ... ultrasound

Love to you all

Debbie

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Primary brain cancers and metastis brain cancers
Unless biopsied ,benign and malignant ,tumors can appear the same in the brain by way of MRI.

The real problem is the displacement of brain matter by the tumor. That can prove fatal to the patient.

So the removal of the tumor by surgery or radiation is the number one concern.
In doing the latter you've treated the symptoms however won't know if it was cancer.

http://cancer.about.com/od/braintumors/ ... ytumor.htm

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Review Article

Brain Metastasis in Bone and Soft Tissue Cancers: A Review of Incidence, Interventions, and OutcomesAbstract

Bone and soft tissue malignancies account for a small portion of brain metastases. In this review, we characterize their incidence, treatments, and prognosis. Most of the data in the literature is based on case reports and small case series. Less than 5% of brain metastases are from bone and soft tissue sarcomas, occurring most commonly in Ewing's sarcoma, malignant fibrous tumors, and osteosarcoma. Mean interval from initial cancer diagnosis to brain metastasis is in the range of 20-30 months, with most being detected before 24 months (osteosarcoma, Ewing sarcoma, chordoma, angiosarcoma, and rhabdomyosarcoma), some at 24-36 months (malignant fibrous tumors, malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumors, and alveolar soft part sarcoma), and a few after 36 months (chondrosarcoma and liposarcoma). Overall mean survival ranges between 7 and 16 months, with the majority surviving < 12 months (Ewing's sarcoma, liposarcoma, malignant fibrous tumors, malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumors, angiosarcoma and chordomas). Management is heterogeneous involving surgery, radiosurgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy. While a survival advantage may exist for those given aggressive treatment involving surgical resection, such patients tended to have a favorable preoperative performance status and minimal systemic disease.



The full link

http://www.hindawi.com/journals/sarcoma/2014/475175/

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http://thejns.org/doi/abs/10.3171/2008.4.17505

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Journal of Neurosurgery
January 2009 / Vol. 110 / No. 1 / Pages 181-186


Oncology
Surgical management of metastatic sarcoma to the brain

Clinical article

http://thejns.org/doi/abs/10.3171/2008.4.17505

I like this conclusive statement

Conclusions

The authors' results suggest that in selected patients, resection of metastatic sarcoma to the brain is associated with a relatively low risk of operative death and results in improvement in neurological function. Patients with systemic control of their primary disease and certain histological subtypes (specifically alveolar soft-part sarcoma) have improved overall and progression-free survival.