Medical students’ ‘landmark’ breakthrough on child brain cancer

Two medical students have made a “landmark” breakthrough in tackling the deadliest form of childhood brain cancer, a disease that has thwarted researchers for decades.

- James Tapper

Jai Sidpra and Valentina Lind, both 26, managed to map how diffuse midline glioma (DMG) spreads through children’s brains, doing research during breaks in their medical training at University College London and Great Ormond Street Hospital, London.

DMG — and its subtype DIPG — is impossible to remove surgically as it starts in the brainstem and grows into a tumour network that spreads through the brain. Most children die within 12 months and only one in 100 survives for at least five years.

The students’ discovery gives hope to families affected by DMG because by mapping the tumour network for the first time, they have found that the cancer has a hidden vulnerability. In parts of the network that are packed with connections, children were more likely to survive if those connections were interrupted during surgery.