John McCain, Vietnam War veteran, 2008 Republican presidential nominee, and longtime U.S. Senator, lost his battle with cancer on August 25. It was just a few days before what would have been his 82nd birthday on August 29.
McCain had been diagnosed with glioblastoma, an aggressive, complex and incurable type of brain cancer only about a year earlier, in July 2017. The disease affects about 700,000 Americans and is the same type of brain cancer that has killed other prominent Americans, including U.S. Senator Edward (Ted) Kennedy and Beau Biden, the son of former Vice President Joe Biden.
Treatment Options and Prognosis
The typical treatments for glioblastoma have been similar to those for other types of cancer. Surgery to remove the brain tumor is a typical first treatment. Then, approaches like radiation and chemotherapy are common. Newer treatments like electric field therapy are somewhat less typical.
But even with aggressive and prompt treatment, the length of time patients survive after diagnosis is still quite short. The average survival is only about a year, with the time period being longer or shorter depending on various factors, including the patient’s age. That is, survival time tends to be shorter for people as the age at diagnosis increases.
Survival without treatment is even shorter, only about 3 months.
Possibilities for Additional Treatments
With all of the money that has been invested into cancer research over so many years, one would think that some progress would have been made toward developing treatments for glioblastoma that actually work and improve survival rates. Better yet, a cure for the horrible disease should be getting closer to being developed.
Research is ongoing, and one area being studied is MicroRNA in tissue culture. Also, gene therapy as a possible treatment for glioblastoma is another research area, but so far, any gene therapy drugs that have been tested have not proven successful.
Intranasal drug delivery, that is, administering medication through the nose and thus getting it more directly to the brain, seems to be a possible treatment. Virotherapy is yet another possible treatment being studied.
One compelling question has to do with what is causing glioblastoma, which seems to be affecting a growing number of people, as various high-profile cases in people like McCain seem to show. Exposure to radiation before diagnosis of the tumor seems like it could be connected to an increase in risk.
In particular, studies into cell phone exposure have indicated that there could be a correlation with the disease, especially among people who have used a cell phone for at least 10 years and have held the phone up against one side of the head.
Let’s all hope that a cure for the type of cancer that took the life of John McCain will be forthcoming in the near future. If nothing else, viable treatments that can improve survival rates are desperately needed. The disease has caused far too much tragedy and suffering, and solutions can’t come soon enough.
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