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Glioblastoma Treatment and Challenges​

  • Standard treatment of patients newly diagnosed with glioblastoma includes surgery to remove as much possible the tumor, radiation therapy, and chemotherapy. Tumor-Treating Fields, a device generating electrical fields to slow tumor growth received FDA-approval in 2015.​

  •  Corticosteroids are used to alleviate cerebral edema (brain swelling) and antiepileptic drugs to control seizures.​

  •  Despite a multimodal treatment, glioblastoma has a two-year survival rate of only 17% and tumor recurrence is inevitable.

Credit: iStock

Some Challenges in Glioblastoma Treatment:​

  •  Surgery limitations due to the tumor location. Despite maximal surgical resection, tumor cells invade surrounding normal brain tissue. ​

  •  Complex clinical management of elderly patients, neurological deficits, treatment side effects. ​

  •  Alterations of genes in the tumor and its microenvironment sustain proliferation, spreading, resistance to cell death, evasion from the immune system, resistance to treatment and tumor recurrence. ​

  •  Glioblastoma stem cells resist to chemotherapy and radiotherapy and initiate a new tumor. ​

  •  Molecular heterogeneity within the same tumor and between patients challenge the concept of one-standard treatment for all.​

  •  The Blood-Brain Barrier protects the brain, which limits access of drugs to the tumor and decreases treatment efficacy. 

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