What We Want You to Know About Brain Tumors

Understandably, a brain tumor can be an incredibly frightening diagnosis, but it’s also a highly complex one. To date, about 150 different types of brain tumors have been documented, some related to cancer, some not. Making matters more complicated, depending upon size and location, even benign growths in the brain can pose serious problems.

At Miami Neuroscience Center, board-certified neurosurgeon Dr. Aizik L. Wolf is one of the leading experts in treating brain tumors of all kinds.

While it would be impossible to cover all that we know about brain tumors in this blog post, we want to highlight a few of the more pertinent facts to take some of the mystery out of this condition.

Dividing brain tumors into two types

The first differentiation we make in brain tumors is whether the growth of abnormal cells is primary or metastatic. By primary, we mean that the tumor, which can be benign or malignant, originates in the tissues of your brain.

On the other hand, a metastatic tumor is related to cancer elsewhere in your body, and the cells have spread into your brain, where they’ve created a growth. Unlike primary brain tumors, these are all related to cancer — usually lung, breast, colon, kidney, or skin cancer.

Brain tumors by the numbers

Whether primary or metastatic, brain tumors in all forms only affect about 30 adults out of every 100,000. When it comes to specific brain and/or spinal cord cancer diagnoses, the American Cancer Society predicts that there will be nearly 25,000 in 2023. 

To put these numbers into perspective, your overall chance of developing a malignant brain tumor is less than 1%.

Types of primary brain tumors

With 150 identified types of brain tumors, you understand that reviewing each type of growth here would be difficult. For this discussion, we’re focussing on the top five primary brain tumors, which include:

1. Schwannomas: the most common benign brain tumor, which affects nerves in your brain
2. Gliomas: the most common type of malignant tumor that affects brain cells called glia
3. Chordomas: benign, slow-growing tumors
4. Craniopharyngiomas: benign tumors around your pituitary gland
5. Meningiomas: mostly benign growths that affect the membrane of your brain

This list is far from comprehensive but gives you a few names and examples of brain tumors.

Symptoms of brain tumors

As you can imagine, a tumor in your central nervous system can lead to a wide range of possible symptoms, depending upon the location. From drooping eyelids and headaches to dizziness and speech problems, the list of possible symptoms is as long as the list of possible tumors.

Solutions for brain tumors

Now we want to get into our area of expertise, which is addressing problematic brain tumors. Dr. Wolf has considerable experience using the advanced Gamma Knife® technique for successfully treating brain tumors.

This technique deserves an entire blog of its own, which we will present next month, so stay tuned.

In the meantime, if you have questions about brain tumors, please don’t hesitate to contact our office in South Miami, Florida, to set up an appointment.