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Any illness or disease that impacts the brain is highly complex. None more so than brain tumors, which affect over 20,000 Americans each year. While surgeons have become more advanced in the removal of brain tumors, experts continue to face extreme challenges in ensuring all cancerous tissues are removed during surgery. That is, until now. 

A recent study found a high-intensity focused ultrasound 2.5 times more effective at identifying cancerous tissue than surgeons alone and significantly better than traditional ultrasound. The newly identified ultrasound cancer treatment technique is referred to as shear wave elastography. 

Shear wave elastography measures the stiffness and stretch within the tissue, with vibrations moving faster through stiffer tissue. Brain tumors tend to be stiffer than normal brain tissue, allowing the new method to map suspicious areas of particular stiffness. In the study, researchers compared this high-intensity focused ultrasound to the standard ultrasound cancer treatment and a surgeon’s opinion regarding which tissues to remove. 

The study used these three different techniques on a total of 26 patients. All of the techniques were compared with gold-standard MRI scans after the surgery – which while effective, are exceptionally time-consuming and expensive. 

While the shear wave elastography ultrasound cancer treatment proved to be the most effective with 94% sensitivity (compared to 73% for the standard ultrasound tumor removal and 36% for the surgeon’s opinion), researchers concluded that the shear wave scans may yield more false positives than surgeons. 

Ensuring all of a brain tumor is removed without damaging healthy tissue is a major challenge in brain surgery. This new type of scan can greatly increase a surgeon’s confidence that no cancer tissue is left behind in surgery. 

The use of this unique ultrasound in cancer treatment makes a significant stride towards improving the health outlook for brain cancer patients. The National Foundation for Cancer Research (NFCR) is also providing new hope in the realm of brain cancer through its partnership with Global Coalition for Adaptive Research (GCAR).

GCAR is a nonprofit organization comprised of some of the world’s foremost physicians, clinical researchers and investigators united in expediting the discovery and development of cures for patients with rare and deadly diseases. GCAR is the official sponsor of GBM AGILE, an adaptive platform trial for patients with glioblastoma (GBM) – the most common and deadliest of malignant primary brain tumors.

The GBM AGILE has been developed with a revolutionary approach to defeating GBM, with the goal of enabling faster and more efficient testing of new agents and combination therapies, better identification of predictive and prognostic biomarkers and delivery of more effective treatments to all glioblastoma patients. GBM AGILE is an innovative approach for treating brain cancer, providing new hope where little existed before.

NFCR continues to fund innovative researchers paving the way to finding new screening methods, treatments, and cures for all cancers, including brain cancer. To learn more about the progress that NFCR-funded scientists are making in the way of brain cancer, visit the NFCR Brain Cancer page. 

Additional Reads You May Enjoy:

“Pink Drink” to Aid Brain Tumor Treatment

Treating Brain Cancer: What You Need to Know

GBM AGILE – Changing the Way We Fight Brain Cancer

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