Abstract
Brain tumours remain one of the most devastating diseases of modern medicine. Although
they only represent approximately 1.9% of primary tumours in Europe, their mortality is
around 70% and they are within the group of the 10 cancer types causing the highest yearly
mortality rate. Gliomas are malignancies of neuroepithelial origin and represent 40-60% of
brain tumours. In particular, glioblastoma multiforme (GBM, astrocytic tumours of type IV)
is the most aggressive and frequent of primary brain tumours, representing 60% of gliomas.
Despite clinical practice advances, the mean survival time of GBM patients has not
improved significantly within the last few decades, and it remains around 12-15 months.
Current standard of care includes maximal safe surgical resection, and a combination of
radio- and chemotherapy with concomitant and adjuvant temozolomide or carmustine
wafers (Wen and Kesari 2008). At the moment, the clinical improvement reached is modest,
with a 5-year survival rate of less than 5% (Mangiola et al. 2010). The poor results obtained
with conventional therapies may be explained by their relatively unspecific nature (Newton
2010), the inefficient delivery of many drugs to the tumoral tissue due to the blood-brain
and blood-tumour barriers, as well as by the intrinsic radio- and chemo-resistance of GBM
(Newton 2010).
they only represent approximately 1.9% of primary tumours in Europe, their mortality is
around 70% and they are within the group of the 10 cancer types causing the highest yearly
mortality rate. Gliomas are malignancies of neuroepithelial origin and represent 40-60% of
brain tumours. In particular, glioblastoma multiforme (GBM, astrocytic tumours of type IV)
is the most aggressive and frequent of primary brain tumours, representing 60% of gliomas.
Despite clinical practice advances, the mean survival time of GBM patients has not
improved significantly within the last few decades, and it remains around 12-15 months.
Current standard of care includes maximal safe surgical resection, and a combination of
radio- and chemotherapy with concomitant and adjuvant temozolomide or carmustine
wafers (Wen and Kesari 2008). At the moment, the clinical improvement reached is modest,
with a 5-year survival rate of less than 5% (Mangiola et al. 2010). The poor results obtained
with conventional therapies may be explained by their relatively unspecific nature (Newton
2010), the inefficient delivery of many drugs to the tumoral tissue due to the blood-brain
and blood-tumour barriers, as well as by the intrinsic radio- and chemo-resistance of GBM
(Newton 2010).
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Novel Therapeutic Concepts in Targeting Glioma |
| Chapter | 8 |
| Pages | 143-160 |
| Number of pages | 17 |
| Publication status | Published - 4 Apr 2012 |
| Externally published | Yes |