Maria Menounos' Emotional Message
- TV host Maria Menounos, 43, shared with fans that her parents’ beloved dog had passed away due to failing health. This was the first time visiting her parents’ home since losing her mother to brain cancer in May.
- A new treatment option called Optune could be a game-changer for those battling the most common brain cancer glioblastoma.
- When dealing with a tragic loss, families have told SurvivorNet that supporting one another has helped them turn sad moments into precious memories.
On Thursday, Menounos took to Instagram to break the news that her parents’ dog, Beethoven, passed away due to failing health. In the post, she shared a number of touching images of Beethoven and her parents over the years, and also revealed that this is the first time she’s visited home since losing her mother to brain cancer.
Read More
View this post on Instagram
Progress in Brain Cancer Treatment
Brain cancer treatment has come a long way in the past few decades, but there’s still a lot more work to be done. However, there is one exciting development in the field that could be a game-changer for those battling brain cancer or dealing with tumors.
For glioblastoma, the most common form of brain cancer that is extremely aggressive and fast growing, there's an option for patients that may extend survival time Optune. This treatment was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in October 2015, and is available to adults at the age of 22 or older. This tumor-treating therapy comes in the form of a cap due that attaches to a patient's head, where electric currents run through adhesive pads. These currents disrupt the division of cancer cells, which can delay the disease from progressing and thus extend the survival time for some patients.
Most glioblastoma's life expectancy currently stands at two years, but during clinical trials using Optune alongside standard treatment, researchers found that this rate went up. For half of the patients, two more years were added to their median survival, and a third of patients saw their survival rates go up by five more years.
"I just want to emphasize to patients that when I first started doing this in 1999, there were maybe less than 5% of patients with this disease that were alive two years," Dr. Suriya Jeyapalan, a Neuro-oncologist at Tufts Medical Center, told SurvivorNet in a previous interview. "Now we're getting out to maybe a third of patients alive at five years. This is not your father's brain tumor, and I want to sort of give a message of hope to patients. In the future we'll add to these treatments and make it even better."
Coping With Loss
Whether it’s a loved one, or a loved pet, coping with loss can be a difficult thing to do all on your own. That’s why for Menounos and her father, going through this experience together may be a helpful way to sort out the roller coaster of emotions you’re feeling. There’s numerous ways to cope with grief, and families who have lost loved ones to the cancer have told SurvivorNet that they’ve been able to channel that sadness, and use it as a way to create happier memories.
This was the case for Camila Legaspi, who lost her mother to breast cancer when she was in high school. It wasn’t until she went to college, and started exploring new passions, that she learned she could turn her sadness into something she ended up cherishing.
"I actually took this sadness and let it motivate me," Camila told SurvivorNet. "I learned that it's OK to be sad sometimes. It's OK to carry sadness with you … it's not always a bad thing. It makes you who you are and it gives you a story to tell and it helps you teach other people to cope with their sadness."
Learn more about SurvivorNet's rigorous medical review process.
