Surviving brain tumour: My 6-year-old and 80-year-old patients show how precision surgery and rehab help

There is a lot of information fog on brain tumours. So let me begin with some of my success stories. A six-and-a half-year old girl has gone back to school after six months and has resumed her normal activities and hobbies. An 80-year-old doctor is now playing golf. I even have a patient of glioblastoma, the most common and malignant brain tumour, who has survived five years after surgery, a rarity in such cases. Many ask me if brain tumour cases are rising in India. I wouldn't say that incidence has increased. But now high-quality MRI and scan options are available in a greater number of cities, so more cases are getting reported. Now we do not need a biopsy to differentiate between brain tumour and brain TB. Al-assisted devices can interpret lesions.

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Brain tumour can affect anybody at any age and you can’t pinpoint causes except that the DNA in the cell changes. Risk factors are family history, exposure to radiation and obesity, the last linked to a certain type of brain tumour called meningioma, which is often benign. Challenges of surgery with kids are that they have less blood volume, so we cannot afford blood loss. You can give them limited anaesthesia and no radiation. The six-and-a-half-year-old came with vomiting, headache and gait imbalance, suggesting the tumour in her brain stem area had increased the swelling, built up fluid and pressure within her brain. We first implanted a shunt, a tube really, to drain the excess fluid into her abdominal cavity for excretion. The definitive surgery we did a week later. It was difficult because of the tumour's location within the brain, sur