Fighting Brain Tumor

The news that my cousin in San Diego, California is undergoing treatment for brain tumor was devastating to his family back here in the Philippines. Even his American husband is losing hope and resorted to frequent the local bar for emotional relief. What’s keep them bonded together is their only son, already a teenager.

Travel Man knows the difficulties being faced by cancer patients, from the regular check-up to the special chemotherapy session that will weaken their body systems. Even if one wins the battle, the remission process will lengthen the agony of getting out of the disease.

The former girlfriend of TM also suffered from brain tumor. Her present condition is that she cannot even recognize her three children and even her husband. It started as a soft lump at the back of her head. She told TM that she bumped her head severely when she was a child. Her parents didn’t even admit her to the hospital for a brain scan.

A simple bump can lead to brain cancer, if it happened at young age, because our skull is not fully developed or harden, especially at the top part. That's why, I was always reminded by my mother to take care of my baby sister carefully, before. Nothing is so sure about this brain malady, for sure. Even brain surgeons said so.

Some acquired brain cancer even at a young age. Others are often diagnosed in their early adult years, just like my cousin in the US.

There are two main types of brain cancer. Primary brain cancer starts in the brain. Metastatic brain cancer starts somewhere else in the body and moves to the brain. Brain tumors can be benign, with no cancer cells, or malignant, with cancer cells that grow quickly.

Brain tumors can cause many symptoms. Some of the most common are

• Headaches, usually worse in the morning
• Nausea and vomiting
• Changes in your ability to talk, hear or see
• Problems with balance or walking
• Problems with thinking or memory
• Muscle jerking or twitching
• Numbness or tingling in arms or legs

If you have any kind of these symptoms, you better seek help from the professionals; your good friend doctor.

We, ordinary people, don't have to know any of the gruesome details, but in simple description, brain cancer is like any cancer invading our body cells, replacing its normal functions;  eating away all the proteins they could extract and attacking our immune cells that prevent invaders (virus, etc.) take over our body.

No one knows the exact causes of brain tumors. Doctors can seldom explain why one person develops a brain tumor and another does not. So, intensive researches are being done every year, because there's so much more to know about cancer, especially brain cancer.

More and more people are becoming aware of the dangers being faced by cancer patients. Concerned agencies convened, with all the necessary legislations from the government in order to help those stricken with brain cancer.

1. American Brain Tumor Association spearheads many activities to collect help, money or in kind to help the needy and encourage th public to be open to all information concerning brain cancer.

2. Support, education and information...these are the factors being promoted by the Brain Tumour Foundation of Canada, a non-profit organization spearheading any projects concerning brain cancer patients.

Many organizations concerning brain cancer patients are drawing their concerns and staging worthwhile activities that can alleviate their sufferings.

Caregivers play a lot of roles attending to cancer patients of all kinds, especially brain cancer. The medication being administered, the pyschological support for the patients...it's like their patience (amost all of them) encourage patients to fight back the cancer.

After all, there's still life left...even if you have cancer, whether you get out of it or not. It's your family that will be at your side when you needed them most.

  The National Brain Tumor Foundation (NBTF) for research in United States estimates that 29,000 people in the U.S are diagnosed with primary brain tumors each year, and nearly 13,000 people die. In children, brain tumors are the cause of one quarter of all cancer deaths. The overall annual incidence of primary brain tumors in the U.S is 11 to 12 per 100,000 people for primary malignant brain tumors, that rate is 6 to 7 per 1,00,000. In the UK, over 4,200 people are diagnosed with a brain tumor every year (2007 estimates).  There are about 200 other types of tumors diagnosed in UK each year.  About 16 out of every 1,000 cancers diagnosed in the UK are in the brain (or 1.6%). In India, totally 80,271 people are affected by various types of tumor (2007 estimates). NBTF reported highest rate of primary malignant brain tumor occurred in Northern Europe, United States and Israel. Lowest rate arised in India and Philippines.