In the last few years, I have discovered that more than one person close to me has been diagnosed with a brain tumor. It was terrifying to hear these words spoken to me, but it is even worse knowing that that person was left with an unclear explanation as to why it happened to them; why they were the one with a tumor. After realizing how little I knew about tumors, I decided that it would be important that I completed research through various reliable medical and scientific sites.

One study that stood out to me was one conducted by the Broad Institute and Massachusetts General Hospital. In their study, they made an important point that no two tumors were exactly alike. I had never thought of a tumor having it’s own identity simply defining it as a generic “tumor,” but each has it’s own genetic makeup.

“Researchers were previously aware that the cells within a human tumor were not all the same – they could have different mutations in their genome and possibly express genes differently – and it is suspected that this diversity may contribute to drug resistance and disease recurrence,” (Broad Institute).

Although, science is very inefficient and wasteful, it still saves lives. Just as we talked about in class, these findings provide evidence that doctors should never assume their treatments work, but should still keep searching for answers in their research with others. Observations of patients at the time of their appointment most likely will be helpful to that individual, but need to be further studied experimentally to help patients’ chances survival as a whole.

“Their study revealed that each glioblastoma tumor contains individual cells from multiple cancer sub-types, and that the distribution of these cells varies from tumor to tumor,” (Broad Institute).

According to UCLA Neurosurgery, “Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM) is the most malignant type of astrocytoma (Grade 4 astrocytoma). The most common tumor of the central nervous system.” Knowing more about the specific attributes of these common tumors is an important step in intricately diagnosing each patient as well as reaching towards a goal of either substantially decreasing or eliminating all types of tumors.  Whether they be self-renewing or differentiated, I believe their should be more studies involving multiple research facilities that collaborate on similar cases.

References:

“Broad Institute, MGH Researchers Chart Cellular Complexity of Brain Tumors.” Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. N.p., 2014. Web. 06 Oct. 2014. <https://www.broadinstitute.org/news/5813>.

“UCLA Neurosurgery.” Glioblastoma: Conditions. UCLA Health, n.d. Web. 07 Oct. 2014. <http://neurosurgery.ucla.edu/body.cfm?id=1123&ref=46&action=detail>.